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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/18643-8.txt b/18643-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..47cad01 --- /dev/null +++ b/18643-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,1809 @@ +Project Gutenberg's The First Landing on Wrangel Island, by Irving C. Rosse + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The First Landing on Wrangel Island + With Some Remarks on the Northern Inhabitants + +Author: Irving C. Rosse + +Release Date: June 21, 2006 [EBook #18643] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE FIRST LANDING ON WRANGEL *** + + + + +Produced by A www.pgdp.net Volunteer, Irma Spehar and the +Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net +(This file was produced from images generously made +available by the Canadian Institute for Historical +Microreproductions (www.canadiana.org)) + + + + + +THE FIRST LANDING ON WRANGEL ISLAND, + +WITH SOME + +REMARKS ON THE NORTHERN INHABITANTS. + +BY + +IRVING C. ROSSE, M.D. + +On May 4, 1881, through the courtesy of the Chief of Revenue Marine, Mr. +E.W. Clark, I was allowed to take passage from San Francisco, Cal., on +board the United States Revenue steamer _Corwin_, whose destination was +Alaska and the northwest Arctic ocean. The object of the cruise was, in +addition to revenue duty, to ascertain the fate of two missing whalers +and, if possible, to communicate with the Arctic exploring yacht +_Jeannette_. + +Our well-found craft made good headway for seven or eight uneventful +days of exceptionally fine weather, while the ocean, somewhat deserving +the adjective that designates it, displayed its prettiest combinations +of blue tints and sunset effects as we steamed through miles of +medusidæ; and had it not been for the sight of occasional whales and the +strange marine birds that characterize a higher latitude, we should +scarcely have known of our approach to the north. Soon, however, we were +beset by pelting hail and furious storms of snow and all the discomforts +of sea life, causing a _pénible navigation_ in every sense of the term. +On May 15 we were somewhat disoriented while trying to make a landfall +in a blinding snowstorm, and groped about for several hours before +anchoring under one of the Alp-like cliffs of the Aleutian islands. + + * * * * * + +Without going into further details of the cruise, I will state that on +the previous year five unsuccessful attempts were made by the _Corwin_ +to reach Herald island, and that Wrangel island was approached to within +about twenty miles. This "problematical northern land," the existence of +which the Russian Admiral Wrangel reported from accounts of Siberian +natives, and which he tried unsuccessfully to find; a land that Captain +Kellett, of Her Britannic Majesty's ship _Herald_, in 1849, thought he +saw, but which, under more favorable circumstances of weather and +position, was not seen by the United States ship _Vincennes_; a land, in +fact, that from the foregoing statements and from the imperfect accounts +of whalemen we had begun to regard as a myth, was actually seen; and I +shall never forget the tinge of regret I felt when the necessity of the +position obliged the withdrawal of the ship and I took a last lingering +look at the ice-bound and unexplored coast, fully realizing at the time +the joyous satisfaction that must animate the discoverer and explorer of +an unknown land. + +However, better luck was in store; for Captain Kellett's discovery was +afterwards completed by the _Corwin_. I now purpose to narrate a few +circumstances attending this first landing on Wrangel island, which may +be best told by further reference to Herald island. Captain Kellett, the +only person known to have landed at the latter place previously to this +account, reports that the extent he had to walk over was not more than +thirty feet, from which space he scrambled up a short distance; that +with the time he could spare and his materials "the island was +perfectly inaccessible." He expresses great disappointment, as from its +summit much could have been seen, and all doubts set aside regarding the +land he supposed he saw to westward. An extract from one of Captain De +Long's letters, making known his intention to retreat upon the Siberian +settlements in the event of disaster to the _Jeannette_, says, in +reference to a ship's being sent to obtain intelligence of him: "If the +ship comes up merely for tidings of us let her look for them on the east +side of Kellett land and on Herald island." Being in a measure guided by +this information, the _Corwin_ made the forementioned places objective +points in the search. It was not, however, till after the coal bunkers +were replenished with bituminous coal from a seam in the cliff above +Cape Lisburne, that an effort was made to reach the island. During the +run westward--a distance of 245 miles--the fine weather enabled us to +witness some curious freaks of refraction and other odd phenomena for +which the high latitudes are so remarkable. On July 30, the fine weather +continuing, everybody was correspondingly elate and merry when both +Herald and Wrangel islands were sighted from the "cro'-nest" and, as +they were neared, apparently free from ice. This illusion, however, was +soon dispelled. On approaching the land strong tide rips were +encountered, and finally the ice, the drift of which was shown by the +drop of a lead-line to be west-northwest. We steamed through about +fifteen miles of this ice before being stopped, less than half a mile +from the southeast end of the island by the fixed ice, to which the ship +was secured with a kedge. We got off, and after considerable climbing +and scrambling up and down immense hummocks, and jumping a number of +crevices, finally set foot on the land we had been so long trying to +reach. Our advent created a great commotion among the myriads of birds +that frequent the ledges and cliffs, and the intrusion caused them to +whirl about in a motley cloud and scream at each other in ceaseless +uproar. A few minutes sufficed to survey the situation, before +attempting to ascend at a spot that seemed scarcely to afford footing +for a goat. Near the foot of the cliffs were seen on the one hand +several detached pinnacles of sombre-looking weather-worn granite that +had withstood the vigor of many Arctic winters; on the other hand a +seemingly inaccessible wall, vividly recalling the eastern face of the +Rock of Gibraltar. This sight, strange and weird beyond description, did +not fail to awaken odd thoughts and emotions, far removed as we were +from all human intercourse, amid solitude and desolation, and for a +moment the mind absorbed a dash of the local coloring. Selecting what +was believed to be the most favorable spot to ascend the cliff, two of +our party in making the attempt would occasionally detach large +bowlders, which came bounding, down like a bombardment. + +The attempt was abandoned after climbing a few hundred feet. In company +with several others, I tried what seemed to be a more practicable way--a +gully filled with snow--up which we had gone scarcely a hundred feet +when it, too, had to be abandoned. In the meantime the skin boat had +been brought over the ice, and one of the men pointing out another place +where he thought we might ascend, it was the work of but a few minutes +to cross a bit of open water which led to the foot of a steep snowbank, +somewhat discolored from the gravel brought down by melting snow. +Without despairing, and being in that frame of mind prepared to incur +danger to a reasonable extent for the sake of knowledge, we climbed +several hundred feet over the snow and ice, having to cut steps with an +axe that we had brought along, before reaching the top. The latter stage +of this proceeding was like scrambling over the dome of the Washington +Capitol with a great yawning cliff below, and was well calculated to try +the nerve of any one except a competent mountaineer or a sailor +accustomed to a doddering mast. A ravine was next reached, through which +tumbled with loud noise and wild confusion, over broken rocks and amid +some scant lichens and mosses, a stream of pure water, which had +hollowed out a shaft or funnel, forming a glacier mill or moulin. It was +over the roof of this tunnel that we had passed, and it caused an +awesome feeling to come over one to see the water leap down its mouth to +an unseen depth with a loud rumbling noise. After a tiresome ascent of +the ravine, this hitherto inaccessible island, like a standing challenge +of Nature inviting the muscular and ambitious, was at last climbed to +the very summit; and it may be remarked, with pardonable vanity, that +the feat was never done before. The view revealed from the top of the +island was a veritable apocalypse. There was something unique about the +desolate grandeur of the novel surroundings that would cause a man of +the Sir Charles Coldstream type to say there "is something in it," and +the most hackneyed man of the world would acknowledge a new sensation. +It was midnight, and the sun shone with gleaming splendor over all this +waste of ice and sea and granite; on one hand Wrangel Island appeared in +well-defined outline, on the other an open sea extended northward as far +as we were able to make out by the aid of strong glasses. From our +position about the middle of the island the two extreme points of +Wrangel island bore southwest and west-by-south respectively. In shape, +Herald island is something like a boot with a depression at the instep, +and at the westernmost extremity, near which it may be climbed with +considerable ease, are found a number of jagged peaks and splintered +pinnacles of granite, some of which resemble the giant remains of +ancient sculpture, all the worse for exposure to the weather. On a +promontory 1,400 feet high at the northeast point of the island I placed +in a cairn a bottle containing written information of our landing and a +copy of the New York _Herald_ of April 23.[1] + +Beyond the extraordinary bird life, no signs of life appeared, except a +small fox, and a Polar bear. The latter put in an appearance just after +we had returned on board at three o'clock in the morning, and the +circumstances attending his slaughter, which were about as enlivening as +shooting a sheep, put an end to this episode of our mission. + +After great difficulty in getting out of the ice we ran all day on +Sunday, July 31, along the edge of the pack with Wrangel Island in +sight, but were unable to find a favorable lead that would take us +nearer the land than twelve or fifteen miles. The principal events that +go to make up the record of our cruise for the next ten days were the +finding of a ship's lower yard; the fabulous numbers of eider ducks seen +off the Siberian coast, and the usual encounters with fogs, bears, and +ice. + +On the morning of August 11, we were so near the unexplored land that we +were most sanguine about getting ashore, although it seemed as if a +journey would have first to be made over the ice. In the afternoon the +chances were so good that I volunteered to go ashore on the ice on the +morning of the 12th in company with Lieutenant Reynolds, Engineer Owen, +and two men. Preparations were made accordingly; the skin boat, rations, +etc., being got ready, and we spent a restless night in anticipating the +events of the coming day. We were called at five o'clock on the morning +of the 12th, and while eating a hurried breakfast the ship steamed +inshore. We were fully prepared for the undertaking; but finding the +leads in the ice more favorable than on the preceding evening, the +little steamer jammed and crashed along in a labyrinthine course not +without great difficulty, for at times she was completely beset by great +masses of ice, which she steamed against at full speed for several +minutes before they showed sign of giving way, and it seemed that all +endeavors to get out of the pack would be futile. Happily, all these +difficulties yielded, and a clear way being seen to a water hole just +off the mouth of a river, we anchored in ten fathoms near some grounded +floebergs, about a quarter of a mile off shore. A boat was then got +away, and on the calm bright morning of August 12, 1881, the first +landing on Wrangel Island was accomplished! + +On the beach, composed of black slaty shingle, we found the skeleton of +a whale from which the baleen was absent; also a quantity of driftwood, +some of it twelve inches in diameter; a wooden wedge; a barrel-stave; a +piece of a boat's spar and a fragment of a biscuit-box. The river, which +we named _Clark river_, was about one hundred yards wide, two fathoms +deep near the mouth, and rapid. From the top of a neighboring cliff, +four hundred feet high, it could be seen trending back into the +mountains some thirty or thirty-five miles. The mountains, devoid of +snow, were seen under favorable circumstances through a rift in the +clouds, and appeared brown and naked, with smooth rounded tops. During a +tramp of some miles over a muddy way, composed of argillaceous clay and +black pebbles, I observed fragments of quartz and granite. Several +specimens containing iron pyrites were also found. The cliffs in the +vicinity of our landing are composed of slate, and the land over which I +travelled seemed almost as barren as a macadamized road; but on +searching closely several species of hyperborean plants were found, such +as saxifrages, anemones, grasses, lichens and mushrooms. The mosses and +lichens were but feebly developed, and the phanerogamous plants were in +the same state of severe repression. The following plants were +collected; and I am indebted to Professor John Muir for their names: + +_Saxifraga flegellaris_, Willd. + _stellaris_, L. var. _cornosa_, Poir. + _sileneflora_, Sternb. + _hieracifolia_, Waldst. & Kit. + _rivularis_, L. var. _hyperborea_, Hook. + _bronchialis_, L. + _serpyllifolia_, Pursh. +_Anemone parviflora_, Michx. +_Papaver nudicaule_, L. +_Draba alpina_, L. +_Cochleria officinalis_, L. +_Artemisia borealis_, Willd. +_Nardosmia frigida_, Hook. +_Saussurea monticola_, Richards. +_Senecio frigidus_, Less. +_Potentilla nivea_, L. + _frigida_, Vill. ? +_Armeria macrocarpa_, Pursh. + _vulgaris_, Willd. +_Stellaria longipes_, Goldie, var. _Edwardsii_, T. & G. +_Cerastium alpinum_, L. +_Gymnandra Stelleri_, Cham. & Schlecht. +_Salix polaris_, Wahl. +_Luzulu hyperborea_, R. Br. +_Poa arctica_, R. Br. +_Aira cæspitosa_, L. var. _Arctica_. +_Alopecurus alpinus_, Smith. + +I made a collection of several spiders and of some larvæ. The spider, it +appears, is an "undescribed species of _Erigone_," and the larvæ are +probably lepidopterous. A small shrike was also secured as a specimen. +We saw several species of gulls, a snowy owl--which by the way was very +shy--a few lemmings, and the tracks of foxes and of bears. + +Microscopic examination of mud obtained from the bottom, in the vicinity +of our anchorage, revealed some shells of foraminifera. The density of +the sea water, and the dip of the magnetic needle were ascertained here, +as well as at other points in the Arctic; and as the observations are +entirely new, I give the results in the accompanying tables. The water +densities are from observations of Mr. F.E. Owen, Assistant Engineer of +the _Corwin_. + +The instruments used in obtaining the results were a thermometer and a +hydrometer. Water was drawn at about six feet below the surface and +heated to a temperature of 200° F., and the saturation, or specific +gravity is shown by the depth to which the hydrometer sank in the water. +As sea water commonly contains one part of saline matter to thirty-two +parts of water, the instrument is marked in thirty-seconds, as 1/32, +2/32, etc., and the densities are fractional parts of one thirty-second: + +--------------------------------------------------------------------- +POINTS OF OBSERVATION. Temperature. Density. +--------------------------------------------------------------------- + +At Saint Michael's, Bering sea 50 1/4 + +Off Plover bay, Asia 34 3/4 + +Arctic ocean, near Bering straits 32 3/4 + +Arctic ocean, near ice on Siberian coast 32 5/8 + +Bering sea, off Saint Lawrence island 34 3/4 + +Golovine bay, Bering sea, July 10 42 1/2 + +Bering sea between King's island and Cape Prince + of Wales, July 12 44 3/4 + +Entrance to Kotzebue sound, July 13 47 3/4 + +Cape Thompson, Arctic ocean, July 17 36 3/4 + +Icy cape, July 24 36 3/4 + +Herald island, in the ice, July 30 31 3/8 + +Cape Wankarem, Siberia, August 5 33 3/4 + +Wrangel island (surface, in ice), August 12 31 1/2 + +Wrangel island (below surface 6 feet), August 12 31 5/8 + +--------------------------------------------------------------------- + +The following table, showing the dip of the magnetic needle, was +prepared from observations made by Lieut. O.D. Myrick: + +---------------------+------------+------------+----------- + | LATITUDE, | LONGITUDE, | + | North. | West. | DIP. +LOCALITY. | Deg. Min. | Deg. Min. | Deg. Min. +---------------------+------------+------------+----------- +ALASKA-- | | | + Ounalaska | 53 56 | 166 13 | 66 53.5 + St. Michael's | 63 27 | 161 37 | 75 00.6 + Kotzebue sound | 66 03 | 161 47 | 77 05.0 + Cape Sabine | 68 50 | 165 10 | 78 47.8 + Icy cape | 70 08 | 161 58 | 79 56.3 + Point Barrow | 71 23 | 156 15 | 81 18.6 + | | | +ASIA-- | | | + Plover bay | 64 21 | 173 11 | 73 34.7 + Cape Wankarem | 67 48 | 175 11 | 77 09.7 + Wrangel island | 71 04 | 177 40 | 79 52.5 +---------------------+------------+------------+----------- + +To commemorate our visit, a flag, placed on a pole of driftwood, was +erected on a cliff, and to the staff was secured a wide-mouthed bottle +and a tin cylinder, in which I enclosed information of our landing, etc. +On raising the flag three cheers were given, and a salute was fired from +the cutter in honor of our newly acquired territory. + +These evidences of our short visit, which was soon afterward +supplemented by the more extended exploration of the _Rodgers_, having +now become matters of history, it may be remarked with pardonable pride +that the acquisition of this remote island, though of no political or +commercial value, will serve the higher and nobler purpose of a +perpetual reminder of American enterprise, courage and maritime skill. + + +GENERAL REMARKS ON THE NORTHERN INHABITANTS. + +From an anthropological point of view the Eskimo coming under +observation proved most interesting. The term Eskimo may be held to +include all the Innuit population living on the Aleutian islands, the +islands of Bering sea, and the shores both of Asia and America north of +about latitude 64°. In this latitude on the American coast the ethnical +points that difference the North American from the Eskimo are distinctly +marked. It cannot, however, be said that the designating marks of +distinction are so plain between the American Eskimo and the so-called +Tchuktschi of the Asiatic coast. I have been unable to see anything more +in the way of distinction than exists between Englishmen and Danes, for +instance, or between Norwegians and Swedes. Indeed, it may be said that +much of the confusion and absurdity of classification found in +ethnographic literature may be traced to a tendency to see diversities +where few or none exist. To the observant man of travel who has given +the matter any attention, it seems that the most sensible classification +is that of the ancient writers who divide humanity into three races, +namely, white, yellow, and black. Cuvier adopted this division, and the +best contemporary British authority, Dr. Latham, also makes three +groups, although he varies somewhat in details from Cuvier. In +accordance with the nomenclature of Latham, the Eskimo may be spoken of +as Hyperborean Mongolidæ of essentially carnivorous and ichthyophagous +habits, who have not yet emerged from the hunting and fishing stage. + + +PHYSICAL PECULIARITIES. + +Their physical appearance and structure having been already described by +others, it is unnecessary to mention them here, except incidentally and +by way of noting a few peculiarities that seem to have been heretofore +overlooked or slightly touched upon by other writers. Although as a rule +they are of short build, averaging about five feet seven inches, yet +occasional exceptions were met with among the natives of Kotzebue sound, +many of whom are tall and of commanding appearance. At Cape Kruzenstern +a man was seen who measured six feet six inches in height. This +divergence from the conventional Eskimo type, as usually described in +the books, may have been caused by inter-marriage with an inland tribe +of larger men from the interior of Alaska, who come to the coast every +summer for purposes of trade. + +The complexion, rarely a true white, but rather that of a Chinaman, with +a healthy blush suffusing each cheek, is often of a brownish-yellow and +sometimes quite black, as I have seen in several instances at Tapkan, +Siberia. Nor is the broad and flat face and small nose without +exception. In the vicinity of East cape, the easternmost extremity of +Asia, a few Eskimo were seen having distinctive Hebrew noses and a +physiognomy of such a Jewish type as to excite the attention and comment +of the sailors composing our crew; others were noticed having a Milesian +cast of features and looked like Irishmen, while others resembled +several old mulatto men I know in Washington. However, the Mongoloid +type in these people was so pronounced that our Japanese boys on meeting +Eskimo for the first time took them for Chinamen; on the other hand the +Japs were objects of great and constant curiosity to the Eskimo, who +doubtless took them for compatriots, a fact not to be wondered at, since +there is such a similarity in the shape of the eyes, the complexion, and +hair. In regard to the latter it may be remarked that scarcely anything +on board the _Corwin_ excited greater wonder and merriment among the +Eskimo than the presence of several persons whom Professor Huxley would +classify in his Xanthocroic group because of their fiery red hair. + +The structure and arrangement of the hair having lately been proposed as +a race characteristic upon which to base an ethnical classification, I +took pains to collect various specimens of Innuit hair, which, in +conjunction with Dr. Kidder, U.S.N., I examined microscopically and +compared with the hair of fair and blue-eyed persons, the hair of +negroes, and as a matter of curiosity with the reindeer hair and the +hair-like appendage found on the fringy extremity of the baleen plates +in the mouth of a "bowhead" whale. Some microphotographs of these +objects were made but with indifferent results. + +To the man willing and anxious to make more extended research into the +matter of race characteristics, I venture to say that a northern +experience will afford him ample opportunity for supplementing Mr. +Murray's paper on the Ethnological Classification of Vermin; and he may +further observe that the Eskimo, whatever may be his religious belief or +predilection, apparently observes the prohibitions of the Talmud in +regard both to filth and getting rid of noxious entomological specimens +that infest his body and habitation. + +Whatever modification the bodily structure of the Eskimo may have +undergone under the influence of physical and moral causes, when viewed +in the light of transcendental anatomy, we find that the mode, plan, or +model upon which his animal frame and organs are founded is +substantially that of other varieties of men. + +Some writers go so far, in speaking of the Eskimo's correspondence, +mental and physical, to his surroundings as to mention the seal as his +correlative, which, in my opinion, is about as sensible as speaking of +the reciprocal relations of a Cincinnati man and a hog. Unlike the seal, +which is preëminently an amphibian and a swimmer, the Eskimo has no +physical capability of the latter kind, being unable to swim and having +the greatest aversion to water except for purposes of navigation. He +wins our admiration from the expert management at sea of his little +shuttle-shaped canoe, which is a kind of marine bicycle, but I doubt +very much the somersaults he is reported to be able to turn in them. In +fact, after offering rewards of that all-powerful incentive, tobacco, on +numerous occasions, I have been unsuccessful in getting any one of them +to attempt the feat, and when told that we had heard of their doing it +they smiled rather incredulously. The Eskimo are clearly not successes +in a cubistic or saltatorial line, as I have had ample opportunities to +observe. They seem to be unable to do the simplest gymnastics, and were +filled with the greatest delight and astonishment at some exhibitions we +gave them on several occasions. Receiving a challenge to run a foot-race +with an Eskimo, I came off easy winner, although I was handicapped by +being out of condition at the time; a challenge to throw stones also +resulted in the same kind of victory; I shouldered and carried some logs +of driftwood that none of them could lift, and on another occasion the +captain and I demonstrated the physical superiority of the Anglo-Saxon +by throwing a walrus lance several lengths farther than any of the +Eskimo who had provoked the competition. As a rule they are deficient in +biceps, and have not the well-developed muscles of athletic white men. +The best muscular development I saw was among the natives of Saint +Lawrence island, who, by the way, showed me a spot in a village where +they practiced athletic sports, one of these diversions being lifting +and "putting" heavy stones, and I have frankly to acknowledge that a +young Eskimo got the better of me in a competition of this kind. It is +fair to assume that one reason for this physical superiority was the +inexorable law of the survival of the fittest, the natives in question +being the survivors of a recent prevailing epidemic and famine. + + +ESKIMO APPETITES. + +As far as my experience goes the Eskimo have not the enormous appetites +with which they are usually accredited. The Eskimo who accompanied +Lieutenant May, of the Nares Expedition, on his sledge journey, is +reported to have been a small eater, and the only case of scurvy, by the +way; several Eskimo who were employed on board the _Corwin_ as +dog-drivers and interpreters were as a rule smaller eaters than our own +men, and I have observed on numerous occasions among the Eskimo I have +visited, that instead of being great gluttons, they are, on the +contrary, moderate eaters. It is, perhaps, the revolting character of +their food--rancid oil, a tray of hot seal entrails, a bowl of +coagulated blood, for example--that causes overestimation of the +quantity eaten. Persons in whom nausea and disgust are awakened at +tripe, putrid game, or moldy and maggoty cheese affected by so-called +epicures, not to mention the bad oysters which George I. preferred to +fresh ones, would doubtless be prejudiced and incorrect observers as to +the quantity of food an Eskimo might consume. From some acquaintance +with the subject I therefore venture to say that the popular notion +regarding the great appetite of the Eskimo is one of the current +fallacies. The reported cases were probably exceptional ones, happening +in subjects who had been exercising and living on little else than +frozen air for perhaps a week. Any vigorous man in the prime of life who +has been shooting all day in the sharp, crisp air of the Arctic will be +surprised at his gastronomic capabilities; and personal knowledge of +some almost incredible instances amongst civilized men might be related, +were it not for fear of being accused of transcending the bounds of +veracity. + + +ORIGIN AND DEVELOPMENT. + +There is so much about certain parts of Alaska to remind one of Scotland +that we wonder why some of the more southern Eskimo have not the +intrepidity and vigor of Scotchmen, since they live under almost the +same topographical conditions amid fogs and misty hills. Perhaps if they +were fed on oatmeal, and could be made to adopt a few of the Scotch +manners and customs, religious and otherwise, they might, after infinite +ages of evolution, develop some of the qualities of that excellent race. +It is probably not so very many generations ago that our British +progenitors were like these original and primitive men as we find them +in the vicinity of Bering straits. Here the mind is taken back over +centuries, and one is able to study the link of transition between the +primitive men of the two continents at the spot where their geographical +relations lead us to suspect it. Indeed, the primitive man may be seen +just as he was thousands of years ago by visiting the village perched +like the eyry of some wild bird about 200 feet up the side of the cliff +at East cape, on the Asiatic side of the straits. This bold, rocky +cliff, rising sheer from the sea to the height of 2,100 feet, consists +of granite, with lava here and there, and the indications point to the +overflow of a vast ice sheet from the north, evidences of which are seen +in the trend of the ridges on the top, and the form of the narrow +peninsula joining the cliff to the mainland. From the summit of the cape +the Diomedes, Fairway Rock, and the American coast are so easily seen +that the view once taken would dispel any doubts as to the possibility +of the aboriginal denizens of America having crossed over from Asia, and +it would require no such statement to corroborate the opinion as that of +an officer of the Hudson Bay Company, then resident in Ungava bay, who +relates that in 1839 an Eskimo family crossed to Labrador from the +northern shore of Hudson's straits on a raft of driftwood. Natives cross +and recross Bering straits to-day on the ice and in primitive skin +canoes, not unlike Cape Cod dories, which have not been improved in +construction since the days of prehistoric man. Indeed, the primitive +man may be seen at East cape almost as he was thousands of years ago. +Evolution and development, with the exception of firearms, seem to have +halted at East cape. The place, with its cave-like dwellings and +skin-clad inhabitants, among whom the presence of white men creates the +same excitement as the advent of a circus among the colored population +of Washington, makes one fancy that he is in some grand prehistoric +museum, and that he has gone backward in time several thousand years in +order to get there. + +While we may do something towards tracing the effects of physical agents +on the Eskimo back into the darkness that antedates history, yet his +geographical origin and his antiquity are things concerning which we +know but little. Being subjects of first-class interest, deserving of +grave study and so vast in themselves, they cannot be touched upon here +except incidentally. Attempting to study them is like following the +labyrinthal ice mazes of the Arctic in quest of the North Pole. + +We may, however, venture the assertion that the Eskimo is of autocthonic +origin in Asia, but is not autocthonous in America. His arrival there +and subsequent migrations are beyond the reach of history or tradition. +Others, though, contend from the analogy of some of the western tribes +of Brazil, who are identical in feature to the Chinese, that the Eskimo +may have come from South America; and the fashion of wearing labrets, +which is common to the indigenous population both of Chili and Alaska, +has been cited as a further proof. + +Touching the subject of early migrations, Mr. Charles Wolcott Brooks, +whose sources of information at command have been exceptionally good, +reports in a paper to the California Academy of Sciences a record of +sixty Japanese junks which were blown off the coast and by the influence +of the Kuro-Shiwo were drifted or stranded on the coast of North +America, or on the Hawaiian or adjacent islands. As merchant ships and +ships of war are known to have been built in Japan prior to the +Christian era, a great number of disabled junks containing small parties +of Japanese must have been stranded on the Aleutian islands and on the +Alaskan coast in past centuries, thereby furnishing evidence of a +constant infusion of Japanese blood among the coast tribes. + +Leaving aside any attempt to show the ethnical relations of these facts, +the question naturally occurs whether any of these waifs ever found +their way back from the American coast. On observing the course of the +great circle of the Kuro-Shiwo and the course of the trade winds, one +inclines to the belief that such a thing is not beyond the range of +possibility. Indeed, several well-authenticated instances are mentioned +by Mr. Brooks; and in connection with the subject he advances a further +hypothesis, namely, the American origin of the Chinese race, and shows +in a plausible way that-- + + The ancestry of China may have embarked in large vessels as + emigrants, perhaps from the vicinity of the Chincha Islands, or + proceeded with a large fleet, like the early Chinese expedition + against Japan, or that of Julius Cæsar against Britain, or the + Welsh Prince Madog and his party, who sailed from Ireland and + landed in America A.D. 1170; and, in like manner, in the dateless + antecedure of history, crossed from the neighborhood of Peru to the + country now known to us as China. + +If America be the oldest continent, paleontologically speaking, as +Agassiz tells us, there appears to be some reason for looking to it as +the spot where early traces of the race are to be found, and the fact +would seem to warrant further study and investigation in connection with +the indigenous people of our continent, thereby awakening new sources of +inquiry among ethnologists. + + +LINGUISTIC PECULIARITIES. + +The sienite plummet from San Joaquin Valley, California, goes back to +the distant age of the Drift; and the Calaveras skull, admitting its +authenticity, goes back to the Pliocene epoch, and is older than the +relics or stone implements from the drift gravel and the European caves. + +It is doubtful, though, whether these data enable us to make +generalizations equal in value to those afforded by the study of +vocabularies. It is alleged that linguistic affinities exist between +some of the tribes of the American coast and our Oriental neighbors +across the Pacific. Mr. Brooks, whom I have already quoted, reports that +in March, 1860, he took an Indian boy on board the Japanese steam +corvette _Kanrin-maru_, where a comparison of Coast-Indian and pure +Japanese was made at his request by Funkuzawa Ukitchy, then Admiral's +secretary; the result of which he prepared for the press and published +with a view to suggesting further linguistic investigations. He says +that quite an infusion of Japanese words is found among some of the +Coast tribes of Oregon and California, either pure or clipped, along +with some very peculiar Japanese "idioms, constructions, honorific, +separative, and agglutinative particles"; that shipwrecked Japanese are +invariably enabled to communicate understandingly with the Coast +Indians, although speaking quite a different language, and that many +shipwrecked Japanese have informed him that they were enabled to +communicate with and understand the natives of Atka and Adakh islands of +the Aleutian group. + +With a view to finding out whether any linguistic affinity existed +between Japanese and the Eskimo dialects in the vicinity of Bering +straits, I caused several Japanese boys, employed as servants on board +the _Corwin_, to talk on numerous occasions to the natives both of the +American and Asiatic coasts; but in every instance they were unable to +understand the Eskimo, and assured me that they could not detect a +single word that bore any resemblance to words in their own language. + +The study of the linguistic peculiarities which distinguish the +population around Bering straits offers an untrodden path in a new +field; but it is doubtful whether the results, except to linguists like +Cardinal Mezzofanti, or philologists of the Max Müller type, would be at +all commensurate with the efforts expended in this direction, since it +is asserted that the human voice is incapable of articulating more than +twenty distinct sounds, therefore whatever resemblances there may be in +the particular words of different languages are of no ethnic value. +Although these may be the views of many persons not only in regard to +the Eskimo tongue but in regard to philology in general, the matter has +a wonderful fascination for more speculative minds. + +Much has been said about the affinity of language among the Eskimo--some +asserting that it is such as to allow mutual intercourse everywhere--but +instances warrant us in concluding that considerable deviations exist in +their vocabularies, if not in the grammatical construction. For +instance, take two words that one hears oftener than any others: On the +Alaska coast they say "na-koo-ruk," a word meaning "good," "all right," +etc.; on the Siberian coast "mah-zink-ah," while a vocabulary collected +during Lieutenant Schwatka's expedition gives the word "mah-muk'-poo" +for "good." The first two of these words are so characteristic of the +tribes on the respective shores above the straits that a better +designation than any yet given to them by writers on the subject would +be _Nakoorooks_ for the people on the American side and _Mazinkahs_ for +those on the Siberian coast. These names, by which they know each +other, are in general use among the whalemen and were adopted by every +one on board the _Corwin_. + +Again, on the American coast "Am-a-luk-tuk" signifies plenty, while on +the Siberian coast it is "Num-kuck-ee." "Tee-tee-tah" means needles in +Siberia, in Alaska it is "mitkin." In the latter place when asking for +tobacco they say "te-ba-muk," while the Asiatics say "salopa." That a +number of dialects exists around Bering straits is apparent to the most +superficial observer. The difference in the language becomes apparent +after leaving Norton sound. The interpreter we took from Saint Michael's +could only with difficulty understand the natives at Point Barrow, while +at Saint Lawrence island and on the Asiatic side he could understand +nothing at all. At East cape we saw natives who, though apparently +alike, did not understand each other's language. I saw the same thing at +Cape Prince of Wales, the western extremity of the New World, whither a +number of Eskimo from the Wankarem river, Siberia, had come to trade. +Doubtless there is a community of origin in the Eskimo tongue, and these +verbal divergencies may be owing to the want of written records to give +fixity to the language, since languages resemble living organisms by +being in a state of continual change. Be that as it may, we know that +this people has imported a number of words from coming in contact with +another language, just as the French have incorporated into their speech +"le steppeur," "l'outsider," "le high life," "le steeple chase," "le +jockey club," etc.--words that have no correlatives in French--so the +Eskimo has appropriated from the whalers words which, as verbal +expressions of his ideation, are undoubtedly better than anything in his +own tongue. One of these is "by and by," which he uses with the same +frequency that a Spaniard does his favorite _mañana por la mañano_. In +this instance the words express the state of development and habits of +thought--one the lazy improvidence of the Eskimo, and the other the +"to-morrow" of the Spaniard, who has indulged that propensity so far +that his nation has become one of yesterday. + +The change of the Eskimo language brought about by its coming in contact +with another forms an important element in its history, and has been +mentioned by the older writers, also by Gilder, who reports a change in +the language of the Iwillik Eskimo to have taken place since the advent +among them of the white men. Among other peculiarities of their +phraseology occurs the word "tanuk," signifying whiskey, and it is said +to have originated with an old Eskimo employed by Moore as a guide and +dog-driver when he wintered in Plover bay. Every day about noon that +personage was in the habit of taking his appetizer and usually said to +the Eskimo, "Come, Joe, let's take our tonic." Like most of his +countrymen, Joe was not slow to learn the meaning of the word, and to +this day the firm hold "tanuk" has on the language is only equalled by +the thirst for the fluid which the name implies. Among the Asiatic +Eskimo the word "um-muck" is common for "rum," while "em-mik" means +water. Even words brought by whalers from the South Sea islands have +obtained a footing, such as "kow-kow" for food, a word in general use, +and "pow" for "no," or "not any." They also call their babies +"pick-a-nee-nee," which to many persons will suggest the Spanish word or +the Southern negro idiom for "baby." The phrase "pick-a-nee-nee kowkow" +is the usual formula in begging food for their children. An Eskimo, +having sold us a reindeer, said it would be "mazinkah kow-kow" (good +eating), and one windy day we were hauling the seine, and an Eskimo +seeing its empty condition when pulled on to the beach, said, "'Pow' +fish; bimeby 'pow' wind, plenty fish." + +The fluency with which some of these fellows speak a mixture of pigeon +English and whaleman's jargon is quite astonishing, and suggests the +query whether their fluency results from the aggressiveness of the +English or is it an evidence of their aptitude? It seems wonderful how a +people we are accustomed to look upon as ignorant, benighted and +undeveloped, can learn to talk English with a certain degree of fluency +and intelligibility from the short intercourse held once a year with a +few passing ships. How many "hoodlums" in San Francisco, for instance, +learn anything of Norwegian or German from frequenting the wharves? How +many "wharf rats" or stevedores in New York learn anything of these +languages from similar intercourse? Or, for that matter, we may ask, How +many New York pilots have acquired even the smallest modicum of French +from boarding the steamers of the Compagnie Générale Transatlantique? + +From a few examples it will be seen that the usage followed by the +Eskimo in its grammatical variations rests on the fixity of the radical +syllable and upon the agglomeration of the different particles intended +to modify the primitive sense of this root, that is to say upon the +principle of agglutinative languages. One or two instances may suffice +to show the agglutinate character of the language. Canoe is "o-me-uk;" +ship "o-me-uk-puk;" steamer "o-me-uk-puk-ignelik;" and this composite +mechanical structure reaches its climax in steam-launch, which they +call "o-me-uk-puk-ignelik-pick-a-nee-nee." + +For snow and ice in their various forms there are also many words which +show further the polysynthetic structure of the language--a fact +contrary to that primitive condition of speech where there are no +inflections to indicate the relations of the words to each other. It +will not do to omit "O-kee-chuck" from this enumeration--a word +signifying trade, barter, or sale, and one most commonly heard among +these people. When they wish to say a thing is bad they use "A-shu-ruk," +and when disapproval is meant they say "pe-chuk." The latter word also +expresses general negation. For instance, on looking into several +unoccupied houses a native informs us "Innuit pechuk," meaning that the +people are away or not at home; "Allopar" is cold, and "allopar pechuk" +is hot. Persons fond of tracing resemblances may find in "Ignik" (fire) +a similarity to the Latin _ignis_ or the English "ignite," and from +"Un-gi doo-ruk" (big, huge) the transition down to "hunky-dory" is easy. +Those who see a sort of complemental relation to each other of +linguistic affinity and the conformity in physical characters may infer +from "Mikey-doo-rook" (a term of endearment equivalent to "Mavourneen" +and used in addressing little children) that the inhabitants within the +Polar Circle have something of the Emerald Isle about them. But no, they +are not Irish, for when they are about to leave the ship or any other +place for their houses they say "to hum"; consequently they are Yankees. + +I do not wish to be thought frivolous in my notions regarding the noble +science of philology; but when one considers the changes that language +is constantly undergoing, the inability of the human voice to articulate +more than twenty distinct sounds, and the wonderful amount of ingenious +learning that has been wasted by philologists on trifling subjects, one +is disposed to associate many of their deductions with the savage +picture-writing on Dighton Rock, the Cardiff Giant, and the old +wind-mill at Newport. + + +ESKIMO DIETETICS. + +Attempts to trace or discover the origin of races through supposed +philological analogies do not possess the advantage of certainty +afforded by the study of the means by which individuals of the race +supply the continuous demands of the body with the nutriment necessary +to maintain life and health. + +Everybody has heard of the seal, bear, walrus, and whale in connection +with Eskimo dietetics, and doubtless the stomachs of most persons would +revolt at the idea of eating these animals, the taste for which, by the +way, is merely a matter of early education or individual preference, for +there is no good reason why they should not be just as palatable to the +northern appetite as pig, sheep, and beef are to the inhabitants of +temperate latitudes. As food they renew the nitrogenous tissues, +reconstruct the parts and restore the functions of the Eskimo frame, +prolong his existence, and produce the same animal contentment and joy +as the more civilized viands of the white man's table. There are more +palatable things than bear or eider duck, yet I know many persons to +whom snails, olive oil, and _paté de fois gras_ are more repugnant. A +tray full of hot seal entrails, a bowl of coagulated blood, and putrid +fish are not very inviting or lickerish to ordinary mortals, yet they +have their analogue in the dish of some farmers who eat a preparation of +pig's bowels known as "chitterlings," and in the blood-puddings and +Limburger cheese of the Germans. Blubber-oil and whale are not very +dainty dishes, yet consider how many families subsist on half-baked +saleratus biscuits, salted pork, and oleomargarine. + +On the mess table of the Fur Company's establishment at St. Paul island, +seal meat is a daily article of consumption, and from personal +experience I can testify as to its palatability, although it reminded +one of indifferent beef rather overdone. Hair seal and bear steaks were +on different occasions tried at the mess on board the Corwin, but +everybody voted eider duck and reindeer the preference. It is not so +very long since that whale was a favorite article of diet in England and +Holland, and Arctic whalemen still, to my personal knowledge, use the +freshly tried oil in cooking; for instance in frying cakes, for which +they say it answers the purpose as well as the finest lard, while others +breakfast on whale and potatoes prepared after the manner of codfish +balls. The whale I have tasted is rather insipid eating, yet it appears +to be highly nutritious, judging from the well-nourished look of natives +who have lived on it, and the air of greasy abundance and happy +contentment that pervades an Eskimo village just after the capture of a +whale. Being ashore one day with our pilot, we met a native woman whom +he recognized as a former acquaintance, and on remarking to her that she +had picked up in flesh since he last saw her, she replied that she had +been living on a whale all the Winter, which explained her plumpness. + +It must not be supposed, however, that the whale, seal and walrus +constitute the entire food supply of the Arctic. There is scarcely any +more toothsome delicacy than reindeer, the tongue of which is very +dainty and succulent. There is one peculiarity about its flesh--in +order to have it in perfection it must be eaten very soon after being +killed; the sooner the better, for it deteriorates in flavor the longer +it is kept. Indeed, the Eskimo do not wait for the animal heat to leave +the carcass, as they eat the brains and paunch hot and smoking. + +While our gastronomic enthusiasm did not extend this far, we dined +occasionally on fresh trout from a Siberian mountain lake, young wild +ducks as fat as squabs, and reindeer, any of which delicacies could not +be had in the same perfection at Delmonico's or any similar +establishment in New York for love or money. There is scarcely any +better eating in the way of fish than _coregonus_--a new species +discovered at Point Barrow by the _Corwin_--and certainly no more dainty +game exists than the young wild geese and ptarmigan to be found in +countless numbers in Hotham inlet. At the latter place, doubtless the +warmest inside the straits, are found quantities of cranberries about +the size of a pea, which not only make a delicious accessory to roasted +goose, but act as a valuable antiscorbutic. These berries and a kind of +kelp, which I have seen Eskimo eating at Tapkan, Siberia, seem to be the +only vegetable food they have. The large quantities of eggs easily +procurable, but in most cases doubtful, also constitute a standard +article of diet among these people, who have no scruples about eating +them partly hatched. They seemed never to comprehend our fastidiousness +in the matter and why our tastes differed so much from theirs in this +respect. They will break an egg containing an embryonic duck or goose, +extract the bird by one leg and devour it with all the relish of an +epicure. Gull's eggs, however, are in disrepute among them, for the +women--who, by the way, have the same frailties and weaknesses as their +more civilized sisters--believe that eating gull's eggs causes loss of +beauty and brings on early decrepitude. The men, on the other hand, are +fond of seal eyes, a tid-bit which the women believe increases their +amorousness, and feed to their lords after the manner of "Open your +mouth and shut your eyes." + +Game is, as a rule, very tame, and during the moulting season, when the +geese are unable to fly, it is quite possible to kill them with a stick. +At one place, Cape Thompson, Eskimo were seen catching birds from a high +cliff with a kind of scoop-net, and I saw birds at Herald island refuse +to move when pelted with stones, so unaccustomed were they to the +presence of man. In addition to being very tame, game is plentiful, and +it is not uncommon, off the Siberian coast, to see flocks of eider ducks +darkening the air and occupying several hours in passing overhead. It +was novel sport to see the natives throw a projectile known as an +"apluketat" into one of these flocks with astonishing range and +accuracy, bringing down the game with the effectiveness of a shotgun. + +Game keeps so well in the Arctic that an instance is known of its being +perfectly sweet and sound on an English ship after two years' keeping, +and whalemen kill a number of pigs, which they hang in the rigging and +keep for use during the cruise. It is also noticeable that leather +articles do not mildew as they generally do at sea, some shoes kept in a +locker on board the _Corwin_ having retained their polish during the +entire cruise. + +The food of the Eskimo satisfies their instinctive craving for a +hydrocarbon, but they do not allow themselves to be much disturbed or +distracted in its preparation, as most of it is eaten raw. They +occasionally boil their food, however, and some of them have learned the +use of flour and molasses, of which they are very fond. + +Their aversion to salt is a very marked peculiarity, and they will not +eat either corned beef or pork on this account. It may be that +physiological reasons exist for this dislike. + + +SOCIAL AND DOMESTIC RELATIONS. + +Omitting other ethnographic facts relative to the Eskimo, which might be +treated in a systematic way except for their triteness, we pass from the +means of the renewal of the animal economy to its reproduction. +Courtship and marriage, which, it is said, are conducted in the most +unsentimental manner possible, are for that reason not to be discussed; +and for obvious reasons many of the prenatal conditions cannot here be +dwelt upon. Having never witnessed the act of parturition in an Eskimo +my knowledge of the subject is merely second-hand, and consequently not +worth detailing. It appears, though, that parturition is a function +easily performed among them, and that it is unattended by the +post-partum accidents common to civilization. As a rule the women are +unprolific, it being uncommon to find a family numbering over three +children, and the mortality among the new-born is excessive, owing to +the ignorance and neglect of the ordinary rules of hygiene. They seem, +however, to be kind to their children, who in respect to crying do not +show the same peevishness as seen in our nurseries; indeed, the social +and demonstrative good nature of the race seems to crop out even in +babyhood, as I have often witnessed under such circumstances as a baby +enveloped in furs in a skin canoe which lay along side the ship during a +snowstorm; its tiny hands protruding held a piece of blubber, which it +sucked with apparent relish, the unique picture of happy contentment. It +was quick to feel itself an object of attraction, and its chubby face +returned any number of smiles of recognition. + +The manner of carrying the infant is contrary to that of civilized +custom. It is borne on the back under the clothes of the mother, which +form a pouch, and from which its tiny head is generally visible over one +or the other shoulder, but on being observed by strangers it shrinks +like a snail or a marsupian into its snug retreat. When the mother wants +to remove it she bends forward, at the same time passing her left hand +up the back under her garments, and seizing the child by the feet, pulls +it downward to the left; then, passing the right hand under the front of +the dress, she again seizes the feet and extracts it by a kind of +podalic delivery. Another common way of carrying children is astride the +neck. The subject is one that the Chucki artist often carves in ivory. + +The play impulse manifests itself among these people in various ways. +They have such mimetic objects as dolls, miniature boats, etc. I have +seen a group of boys, sailing toy boats in a pond, behave under the +circumstances just as a similar group has been observed to do at +Provincetown, Cape Cod, and the same act, as performed in the Frog Pond +of the Boston Common, may be called only a differentiated form of the +same tendency. Their dolls, of ivory and clothed with fur, seem to +answer the same purpose that they do in civilized communities--namely, +the amusement of little girls--for at one place where we landed a number +of Eskimo girls, stopping play on our approach, sat their dolls up in a +row, evidently with a view to giving the dolls a better look at the +strange visitors. Spinning tops, essentially Eskimo and unique in their +character, are held in the hand while spinning; on the Siberian coast +football is played, and among other questionable things acquired from +contact with the whalemen, a knowledge of card-playing exists. We were +very often asked for cards, and at one place where we stopped and +bartered a number of small articles with the natives they gave evidence +of their aptitude at gaming. The game being started, with the bartered +articles as stakes, one fellow soon scooped in everything, leaving the +others to go off dead-broke, amid the ridicule of some of our crew, and +doubtless feeling worse than dead, for among no people that I have seen, +not even the French, does ridicule so effectually kill. + + +PERSONAL ORNAMENTATION. + +Among the means taken by these people to produce personal ornamentation +that of tattooing the face and wearing a labret is the most noticeable. +The custom of tattooing having existed from the earliest historical +epochs is important, not only from an ethnological but from a medical +and pathological point of view, and even in its relation to medical +jurisprudence in cases of contested personal identity. + +Without going into the history of the subject, it may not be irrelevant +to mention that tattooing was condemned by the Fathers of the Church, +Tertullian, among others, who gives the following rather singular reason +for interdicting its use among women: "Certi sumus Spiritum Sanctum +magis masculis tale aliquid subscribere potuisse si feminis +subscripsisset."[2] + +In addition to much that has been written by French and German writers, +the matter of tattoo-marks has of late claimed the attention of the law +courts of England, the Chief-Justice, Cockburn, in the Tichbourne case, +having described this species of evidence as of "vital importance," and +in itself final and conclusive. The absence of the tattoo-marks in this +case justified the jury in their finding that the defendant was not and +could not be Roger Tichbourne, whereupon the alleged claimant was proved +to be an impostor, found guilty of perjury, and sentenced to penal +servitude.[3] + +[Illustration: Style of personal ornamentation adopted by the women of +Saint Lawrence island.] + +Why the ancient habit of tattooing should prevail so extensively among +some of the primitive tribes as it does, for instance, in the Polynesian +islands and some parts of Japan, and we may say as a survival of a +superstitious practice of paganism among sailors and others, is a +psychological problem difficult to solve. Whether it be owing to +perversion of the sexual instinct, which is not unlikely, or to other +cause, it is not proposed to discuss. Be that as it may, the prevalence +of the habit among the Eskimo is confined to the female sex, who are +tattooed on arriving at the age of puberty. The women of Saint Lawrence +island, in addition to lines on the nose, forehead and chin, have +uniformly a figure of strange design on the cheeks, which is suggestive +of cabalistic import. It could not be ascertained, however, whether such +is the case. The lines drawn on the chin were exactly like the ones I +have seen on Moorish women in Morocco. Another outlandish attempt at +adornment was witnessed at Cape Blossom in a woman who wore a bunch of +colored beads suspended from the septum of her nose. These habits, +however, hardly seem so revolting as the use of the labret by the +"Mazinka" men on the American coast, of whom it is related that a sailor +seeing one of them for the first time, and observing the slit in the +lower lip through which the native thrust his tongue, thought he had +discovered a man with two mouths. The use of the labret, like many of +the attempts at primitive ornamentation, is very old, its use having +been traced by Dall along the American coast from the lower part of +Chili to Alaska. Persons fond of tracing, vestiges of savage +ornamentation amid intellectual advancement and æsthetic sensibility far +in advance of the primitive man, may observe in the wearers of bangles +and earrings the same tendency existing in a differentiated form. + + +DIVERSIONS. + +I doubt whether Shakespeare's dictum in regard to music holds good when +applied to the Eskimo, for they have but little music in their souls, +and among no people is there such a noticeable absence of "treason, +stratagem and spoil." A rude drum and a monotonous chant, consisting +only of the fundamental note and minor third, are the only things in the +way of music among the more remote settlements of which I have any +knowledge. Mrs. Micawber's singing has been described as the table-beer +of acoustics. Eskimo singing is something more. The beer has become flat +by the addition of ice. One of our engineers, who is quite a fiddler, +experimented on his instrument with a view to seeing what effect music +would have on the "savage breast," but his best efforts at rendering +"Madame Angot" and the "Grande Duchesse" were wasted before an +unsympathetic audience, who showed as little appreciation of his +performance as some people do when listening to Wagner's "Music of the +Future." + +Where they have come in contact with civilization their musical taste is +more developed. At Saint Michael's I was told that some of their songs +are so characteristic that it is much to be regretted that some of them +cannot be bottled up in a phonograph and sent to a musical composer. On +the coast of Siberia I heard an Eskimo boy sing correctly a song he had +learned while on board a whaling vessel, and on several of the Aleutian +islands the natives play the accordeon quite well; have music-boxes, and +even whistle strains from "Pinafore." + +From music to dancing the transition is obvious, no matter whether the +latter be regarded in a Darwinian sense as a device to attract the +opposite sex or as the expression of joyous excitement. This +manifestation of feeling in its bodily discharge, which Moses and Miriam +and David indulged in, which is ranked with poetry by Aristotle, and +which old Homer says is the sweetest and most perfect of human +enjoyments, is a pastime much in vogue among the Eskimo, and it required +but little provocation to start a dance at any time on the _Corwin's_ +decks when a party happened to be on board. The dancing, however, had +not the cadence of "a wave of the sea," nor was there the harmony of +double rotation circling in a series of graceful curves to strains like +those of Strauss or Gungl. On the contrary, there was something +saltatorial and jerky about all the dancing I saw both among the men and +women. It is the custom at some of their gatherings, after the hunting +season is over, for the men to indulge in a kind of terpsichorean +performance, at the same time relating in Homeric style the heroic deeds +they have done. At other times the women do all the dancing. Being +stripped to the waist they are more _décolleté_ than our beauties at the +German, and the men take the part of spectators only in this +choreographical performance. + + +ART INSTINCT. + +The aptitude shown by Eskimo in carving and drawing has been noticed by +all travellers among them. Some I have met with show a degree of +intelligence and appreciation in regard to charts and pictures scarcely +to be expected from such a source. From walrus ivory they sculpture +figures of birds, quadrupeds, marine animals, and even the human form, +which display considerable individuality notwithstanding their crude +delineation and imperfect detail. I have also seen a fair carving of a +whale in plumbago. Evidences of decoration are sometimes seen on their +canoes, on which are found rude pictures of walruses, etc., and they +have a kind of picture-writing, by means of which they commemorate +certain events in their lives, just as Sitting Bull has done in an +autobiography that may be seen at the Army Medical Museum. + +When we were searching for the missing whalers off the Siberian coast, +some natives were come across with whom we were unable to communicate +except by signs, and wishing to let them know the object of our visit, a +ship was drawn in a note-book and shown to them, with accompanying +gesticulations, which they quickly comprehended, and one fellow, taking +the pencil and note-book, drew correctly a pair of reindeer horns on the +ship's jib-boom--a fact which identified, beyond doubt, the derelict +vessel they had seen. At Point Hope an Eskimo, who had allowed us to +take sketches of him, desired to sketch one of the party, and taking one +of our note-books and a pencil, neither of which he ever had in his hand +before, produced the accompanying likeness of Professor Muir: + +[Illustration] + +At Saint Michael's there is an Eskimo boy who draws remarkably well, +having taught himself by copying from the _Illustrated London News_. He +made a correct pen-and-ink drawing of the _Corwin_, and another of the +group of buildings at Saint Michael's, which, though creditable in many +respects, had the defect of many Chinese pictures, being faulty in +perspective. As these drawings equal those in Dr. Rink's book, done by +Greenland artists, I regret my inability to reproduce them here. As +evidences of culture they show more advancement than the carvings of +English rustics that a clergyman has caused to be placed on exhibition +at the Kensington Museum. + +Sir John Ross speaks highly of his interpreter as an artist; Beechy says +that the knowledge of the coast obtained by him from Innuit maps was of +the greatest value, while Hall and others show their geographical +knowledge to be as perfect as that possible of attainment by civilized +men unaided by instruments. I had frequent opportunities to observe +these Eskimo ideas of chartography. They not only understood reading a +chart of the coast when showed to them, but would make tracings of the +unexplored part, as I knew a native to do in the case of an Alaskan +river, the mouth only of which was laid down on our chart. + +Manifestation of the plastic art, which is found among tribes less +intelligent, is rare among the Eskimo. In fact, the only thing of the +kind seen was some rude pottery at Saint Lawrence island, the design of +which showed but crude development of ornamental ideas. The same state +of advancement was shown in some drinking cups carved from mammoth ivory +and a dipper made from the horn of a mountain sheep. + + +COMBATIVENESS. + +In one of the acts of Shakespeare's "Seven Ages" the Eskimo plays a very +unimportant _rôle_. Perhaps in no other race is the combative instinct +less predominant; in none is quarrelling, fierceness of disposition, and +jealousy more conspicuously absent, and in none does the desire for the +factitious renown of war exist in a more rudimentary and undeveloped +state. Perhaps the constant fight with cold and hunger is a compensation +which must account for the absence of such unmitigated evils as war, +taxes, complex social organization and hierarchy among the curious +people of the icy north. The pursuits of peace and of simple patriarchal +lives, notwithstanding the fact of much in connection therewith that is +wretched, and forbidding to a civilized man, seem to beget in these +people a degree of domestic tranquility and contentment which, united to +their light-hearted and cheery disposition, is an additional reason for +believing the sum of human happiness to be constant throughout the +world. + + +MENTAL CHARACTER AND CAPACITY. + +The intellectual character of the Eskimo, judging from the information +which various travellers have furnished, as well as my personal +knowledge, produces more than a feeble belief in the possibility of +their being equal to anything they choose to take an interest in +learning. The Eskimo is not "muffled imbecility," as some one has called +him, nor is he dull and slow of understanding, as Vitruvius describes +the northern nation to be "from breathing a thick air"--which, by the +way, is thin, elastic and highly ozonized--nor is he, according to Dr. +Beke, "degenerated almost to the lowest state compatible with the +retention of rational endowments." On the contrary, the old Greenland +missionary, Hans Egede, writes: "I have found some of them witty enough +and of good capacity;" Sir Martin Frobisher says they are "in nature +very subtle and sharp-witted;" Sir Edward Parry, while extolling their +honesty and good nature, adds, "Indeed, it required no long acquaintance +to convince us that art and education might easily have made them equal +or superior to ourselves;" Sauer tells of a woman who learned to speak +Russian fluently in rather less than twelve months, and Beechy and +others have acknowledged the intelligent help they have received from +Eskimo in making their explorations. + +Before going further, it may not be amiss to speak in a general way of +the bony covering which protects the organ whose function it is to +generate the vibrations known as thought. Of one hundred crania, +collected principally at Saint Lawrence island, a number were examined +by me at the Army Medical Museum, through the courtesy of Dr. +Huntington, with the result of changing and greatly modifying some of +the previous notions of the conventional Eskimo skull as acquired from +books on craniology. Perhaps after the inspection and examination of a +large collection of crania, it may be safe to pronounce upon their +differential character; but whether the differences in configuration are +constant or only occasional manifestations, admits of as much doubt as +the exceptions in Professor Sophocles's Greek grammar, which are often +coextensive with the rule.[4] + +The typical Eskimo skull, according to popular notion, is one exhibiting +a low order of intelligence, and characterized by small brain capacity, +with great prominence of the superciliary ridges, occipital +protuberance and zygomatic arches, the latter projecting beyond the +general contour of the skull like the handles of a jar or a peach +basket; and lines drawn from the most projecting part of the arches and +touching the sides of the frontal bone are supposed to meet over the +forehead, forming a triangle, for which reason the skull is known as +pyramidal. + +The first specimen, examined from a vertical view, shows something of +the typical character as figured in A, and when viewed posteriorly there +is noticed a flattening of the parietal walls with an elongated vertex +as shown in D; while a second specimen, represented by B, shows none of +the foregoing characteristics, the form being elongated and the parietal +walls so far overhanging as to conceal the zygomatic arches in the +vertical view, so that if lines be drawn as previously mentioned, +instead of forming a triangle they may, like the asymptotes of a +parabola, be extended to infinity and never meet. + +For purposes of comparison a number of orthographic outlines, showing +the contour of civilized crania, from a vertical point of observation, +are herewith annexed. No. 1 is that of an eminent mathematician who +committed suicide; No. 2, a prominent politician during the civil war; +No. 3, a banker; and No. 4, a notorious assassin. Nos. 5 and 6 are negro +skulls. Further comparison may be made with the Jewish skull, as +represented in No. 7, in which the nasal bones project so far beyond the +general contour as to form a bird-like appendage. + +[Illustration: A] + +[Illustration: B] + +[Illustration: C] + +[Illustration: D] + +A collection of Aleutian heads, as seen from a vertical point of +observation, when I looked down from the gallery of the little Greek +church at Ounalaska, presented at first certain collective characters +by which they approach one another. But anatomists know that a careful +comparison of any collection will show extremely salient differences. In +fact, individual differences, so numerous and so irregular as to prevent +methodical enumeration, constitute the stumbling-block of ethnic +craniology. Take, for instance, a number of the skulls under +consideration: in proportions they will be found to present very +considerable variations among themselves. The skulls figured by A and B +are respectively brachycephalic and dolichocephalic. The former has an +internal capacity of 1,400, the latter 1,214 cubic centimeters; but the +facial angle of each is 80°, and in one Eskimo cranium it runs up to +84°. If the facial angle be trustworthy, as a measure of the degree of +intelligence, we have shown here a development far in excess of the +negro, which is placed at 70°, or of the Mongolian at 75°, and exceeding +that observed by me in many German skulls, which do not, as a rule, come +up to the 90° of Jupiter Tonans or of Cuvier, in spite of the boasted +intelligence of that nationality. + +[Illustration: _No. 1._] + +[Illustration: _No. 2._] + +[Illustration: _No. 3._] + +[Illustration: _No. 4._] + +[Illustration: _No. 5._] + +[Illustration: _No. 6._] + +In none of the skulls of the collection is there observable the heavy +superciliary ridges alleged to be common in lower races, but which exist +in many of the best-formed European crania--shall we say as anomalies +or as individual variations? Nor is the convexity of the squamo-parietal +suture such as characterizes the low-typed cranium of the chimpanzee or +the Mound Builder. On the contrary, the orbits are cleanly made and the +suture is well curved. Besides, a low degree of intelligence is not +shown by observing the index of the foramen magnum, which is about the +same as that found in European crania; and the same may be said of the +internal capacity of the cranium. To illustrate the latter remark is +appended a tabular statement made up from Welcker, Broca, Aitken and +Meigs: + + Cubic centimeters. + +Australian 1,228 +Polynesian 1,230 +Hottentot 1,230 +Mexican 1,296 +Malay 1,328 +Ancient Peruvian 1,361 +French 1,403 to 1,461 +German 1,448 +English 1,572 + +An average of the Eskimo skull, some of which measure as much as 1,650 +and 1,715 c.c., will show the brain capacity to be the same as that of +the French or of the Germans. None of them, however, approaches the +anomalous capacities of two Indian skulls on exhibition at the Army +Medical Museum, one of which shows 1,785 c.c., and the other the +unprecedented measurement of 1,920 c.c. + +If the foregoing means for estimating the mental grasp and capacity for +improvement be correct, then we must accord to the most northern nation +of the globe a fair degree of brain energy--potential though it be. +Aside from the mere physical methods of determining the degree of +intelligence, it is urged by some writers, among them the historian +Robertson, that tact in commerce and correct ideas of property are +evidence of a considerable progress toward civilization. The natural +inference from this is that they are tests of intellectual power, since +mind is a combination of all the actual and possible states of +consciousness of the organism, and an examination of the Eskimo system +of trade draws its own conclusion. Their fondness for trade has been +known for a long time, as well as the extended range of their commercial +intercourse. They trade with the Indians, with the fur companies, the +whalers and among themselves across Bering straits. Many of them are +veritable Shylocks, having a through comprehension of the axiom in +political economy regarding the regulation of the price of a thing by +the demand. + +[Illustration: _No. 7._] + + +THE MORAL SENSE AND THE RELIGIOUS INSTINCT. + +With the aptitudes and instincts of our common humanity Eskimo morals, +as manifested in truth, right and virtue, also admit of remark. Except +where these people have had the bad example of the white man, whose +vices they have imitated, not on account of defective moral nature, but +because they saw few or no virtues, they are models of truthfulness and +honesty. In fact their virtues in this respect are something phenomenal. +The same cannot be said, however, for their sexual morals, which, as a +rule, are the contrary of good. Even a short stay among the hyperboreans +causes one to smile at Lord Kames's "frigidity of the North Americans," +and at the fallacy of Herder who says, "the blood of man near the pole +circulates but slowly, the heart beats but languidly; consequently the +married live chastely, the women almost require compulsion to take upon +them the troubles of a married life," etc. Nearly the same idea +expressed by Montesquieu, and repeated by Byron in "happy the nations of +the moral North," are statements so at variance with our experience that +this fact must alone excuse a reference to the subject. So far are they +from applying to the people in question that it is only necessary to +mention, without going into detail, that the women are freely offered to +strangers by way of hospitality, showing a decided preference for white +men, whom they believe to beget better offspring than their own men. In +this regard one is soon convinced that salacious and prurient tastes are +not the exclusive privilege of people living outside of the Arctic +Circle; and observation favors the belief in the existence of pederasty +among Eskimo, if one may be allowed to judge from circumstances, which +it is not necessary to particularize, and from a word in their language +signifying the act. + +Since morality is the last virtue acquired by man and the first one he +is likely to lose, it is not so surprising to find outrages on morals +among the undeveloped inhabitants of the north as it is to find them in +intelligent Christian communities among people whose moral sense ought +to be far above that of the average primitive man in view of their +associations and the variations that have been so frequently repeated +and accumulated by heredity; and where there is no hierarchy nor +established missionaries it is still more surprising to find any moral +sense at all among a people whose vague religious belief does not extend +beyond Shamanism or Animism, which to them explains the more strange and +striking natural phenomena by the hypothesis of direct spiritual agency. + +It must not be understood by this, however, that these people have no +religion, as many travellers have erroneously believed; that would be +almost equivalent to stating that races of men exist without speech, +memory or knowledge of fire. A purely ethnological view of religion +which regards it as "the feeling which falls upon man in the presence of +the unknown," favors the idea that the children of the icy north have +many of the same feelings in this respect as those experienced by +ourselves under similar conditions, although there is doubtless a change +in us produced by more advanced thought and nicer feeling. On the other +hand, how many habits and ideas that are senseless and perfectly +unexplainable by the light of our present modes of life and thought can +be explained by similar customs and prejudices existing among these +distant tribes. Is there no fragment of primitive superstition or +residue of bygone ages in the supposed influence of the "Evil Eye" in +Ireland, or in the habit of "telling the bees" in Germany? Is there not +something of intellectual fossildom in the popular notion about Friday +and thirteen at table, and in the ancient rite of exorcising oppressed +persons, houses and other places supposed to be haunted by unwelcome +spirits, the form of which is still retained in the Roman ritual? And is +not our enlightened America "the land of spiritualists, mesmerism, +soothsaying and mystical congregations"? + +When the native of Saint Michael's invokes the moon, or the native of +Point Barrow his crude images previously to hunting the seal, in order +to bring good luck, is not the mental and emotional impulse the same as +that which actuates more civilized men to look upon "outward signs of an +inward and spiritual grace," or not to start upon any important +undertaking without first invoking the blessing of Deity? And are not +the rites observed by the natives on the Siberian coast, when the first +walrus is caught, the counterpart of our Puritan Thanksgiving Day? + +Perhaps the untutored Eskimo has the same fear of the dangerous and +terrible, the unknown, the infinite, as ourselves, and parts with life +just as reluctantly: but it cannot be said that our observation favors +the fact of his longevity, although long life seems to prevail among +some of the circumpolar tribes, the Laps, for instance, who, according +to Scheffer, in spite of hard lives enjoy good health, are long-lived, +and still alert at eighty and ninety years.--(De Medecina Laponum.) + +Owing to his hard life, the conflict with his circumstances and his want +of foresight, the Eskimo soon becomes a physiological bankrupt, and his +stock of vitality being exhausted, his bodily remains are covered with +stones, around which are placed wooden masks and articles that have +been useful to him during life, as I have seen at Nounivak island, or +they are covered with driftwood as observed in Kotzebue sound, or as at +Tapkan, Siberia, where the corpse is lashed to a long pole and is taken +some distance from the village, when the clothes are stripped off, +placed on the ground and covered with stones. The cadaver is then +exposed in the open air to the tender mercies of crows, foxes and +wolves. The weapons and other personal effects of the decedent are +placed near by, probably with something of the same sentiment that +causes us to use chaplets of flowers and immortelles as funeral +offerings--a custom that Schiller has commemorated in "Bringet hier die +letzen Gaben." + +The future destiny of these people is a question in which the theologian +and politician are not less interested than the man of science. Some +observers seem to think that their numbers are diminishing under the +evil influence of so-called civilization. But as every race participates +in the same moral nature, and the entire history of humanity, according +to Herder, is a series of events pointing to a higher destiny than has +yet been revealed, there is no reason why the sum of human happiness, +under proper auspices, should not be increased among the Innuit race. +Arch-deacon Kirkby, a Church of England clergyman who has lately visited +them in a missionary capacity as far as Boothia, speaks in the highest +terms of their intelligence and capacity for improvement. Here, then, is +a brilliant opportunity for some one full of propagandism and charity to +repeat the acts of the modern apostles and extend the influence of +civilization to the gay, lively, curious and talkative hyperboreans +whose home is under the midnight sun and on the borders of the Icy Sea. + +[Illustration: WRANGEL ISLAND. + +Journal, American Geographical Society, Vol. XV, 1883. + +Bulletin Nº. 3. Rosse.] + +FOOTNOTES: + +[Footnote 1: In November, 1882, while in London, I met Mr. Gilder, the +_Herald_ correspondent, who accompanied the U.S. ship _Rodgers_, and he +showed me this record and paper which he had taken from the cairn during +a subsequent visit to the island.] + +[Footnote 2: De Virginibus velandis. Lutetiæ Parisiorum. 1675 fº., p. +178.] + +[Footnote 3: See Guy's Hospital Report, XIX, 1874; also "Histoire +Médicale du Tatouage," in Archives de Médecine Navale, Tom. 11 and 12, +Paris, 1869.] + +[Footnote 4: Retzius, Finska Kranier, Stockholm: 1878.] + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The First Landing on Wrangel Island, by +Irving C. 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Rosse, M.D. + </title> + <style type="text/css"> +/*<![CDATA[ XML blockout */ +<!-- + p { margin-top: .75em; + text-align: justify; + margin-bottom: .75em; + text-indent: 1em; + } + h1,h2,h3,h5,h6 { + text-align: center; /* all headings centered */ + clear: both; + } + + h4 {text-align: center; + margin-top: 2em; + clear: both; + } + hr { width: 33%; + margin-top: 2em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; + clear: both; + } + + table {margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;} + td {border-right: 1pt black solid; + text-align: center; + } + th {border-right: 1pt black solid; + border-top: 3pt black double; + } + + img + {border-style: none; + } + + ul {list-style-type: none; + margin-left: 3em; + } + + li.list1 {list-style-type: none; + margin-left: 4em; + } + li.list2 {list-style-type: none; + margin-left: 3.5em; + } + + body{margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + } + + .above, .below { font-size: 70%; + font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; } + .above { vertical-align: 0.7ex; } + .below { vertical-align: -0.3ex; } + .pagenum { /* uncomment the next line for invisible page numbers */ + visibility: hidden; + position: absolute; + left: 92%; + font-size: smaller; + text-align: right; + } /* page numbers */ + + .blockquot{margin-left: 5%; margin-right: 10%;} + .bbox {border: solid 2px;} + + .center {text-align: center;} + .smcap {font-variant: small-caps;} + + .caption {font-weight: bold; text-align: center; margin-top: 2em;} + + .figcenter {margin: 0.5em; text-align: center;} + .footnotes {border: dashed 1px; margin-top: 3em;} + .footnote {margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-size: 0.9em;} + .footnote .label {position: absolute; right: 84%; text-align: right;} + .fnanchor {vertical-align: super; font-size: .8em; text-decoration: none;} + // --> + /* XML end ]]>*/ + </style> + </head> +<body> + + +<pre> + +Project Gutenberg's The First Landing on Wrangel Island, by Irving C. Rosse + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The First Landing on Wrangel Island + With Some Remarks on the Northern Inhabitants + +Author: Irving C. Rosse + +Release Date: June 21, 2006 [EBook #18643] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE FIRST LANDING ON WRANGEL *** + + + + +Produced by A www.pgdp.net Volunteer, Irma Spehar and the +Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net +(This file was produced from images generously made +available by the Canadian Institute for Historical +Microreproductions (www.canadiana.org)) + + + + + + +</pre> + + +<h1>THE FIRST LANDING ON WRANGEL ISLAND,</h1> + +<h3>WITH SOME</h3> + +<h2 style="padding: 1em;">REMARKS ON THE NORTHERN INHABITANTS.</h2> + +<h3>BY</h3> + +<h2>IRVING C. ROSSE, M.D.</h2> + +<p style="margin-top: 3em">On May 4, 1881, through the courtesy of the Chief of Revenue Marine, Mr. +E. W. Clark, I was allowed to take passage from San Francisco, Cal., on +board the United States Revenue steamer <i>Corwin</i>, whose destination was +Alaska and the northwest Arctic ocean. The object of the cruise was, in +addition to revenue duty, to ascertain the fate of two missing whalers +and, if possible, to communicate with the Arctic exploring yacht +<i>Jeannette</i>.</p> + +<p>Our well-found craft made good headway for seven or eight uneventful +days of exceptionally fine weather, while the ocean, somewhat deserving +the adjective that designates it, displayed its prettiest combinations +of blue tints and sunset effects as we steamed through miles of +medusidæ; and had it not been for the sight of occasional whales and the +strange marine birds that characterize a higher latitude, we should +scarcely have known of our approach to the north. Soon, however, we were +beset by pelting hail and furious storms of snow and all the discomforts +of sea life, causing a <i>pénible navigation</i> in every sense of the term. +On May 15 we were somewhat disoriented while trying to make a landfall +in a blinding snowstorm, and groped about for several hours before +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2">[Pg 2]</a></span>anchoring under one of the Alp-like cliffs of the Aleutian islands.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>Without going into further details of the cruise, I will state that on +the previous year five unsuccessful attempts were made by the <i>Corwin</i> +to reach Herald island, and that Wrangel island was approached to within +about twenty miles. This "problematical northern land," the existence of +which the Russian Admiral Wrangel reported from accounts of Siberian +natives, and which he tried unsuccessfully to find; a land that Captain +Kellett, of Her Britannic Majesty's ship <i>Herald</i>, in 1849, thought he +saw, but which, under more favorable circumstances of weather and +position, was not seen by the United States ship <i>Vincennes</i>; a land, in +fact, that from the foregoing statements and from the imperfect accounts +of whalemen we had begun to regard as a myth, was actually seen; and I +shall never forget the tinge of regret I felt when the necessity of the +position obliged the withdrawal of the ship and I took a last lingering +look at the ice-bound and unexplored coast, fully realizing at the time +the joyous satisfaction that must animate the discoverer and explorer of +an unknown land.</p> + +<p>However, better luck was in store; for Captain Kellett's discovery was +afterwards completed by the <i>Corwin</i>. I now purpose to narrate a few +circumstances attending this first landing on Wrangel island, which may +be best told by further reference to Herald island. Captain Kellett, the +only person known to have landed at the latter place previously to this +account, reports that the extent he had to walk over was not more than +thirty feet, from which space he scrambled up a short distance; that +with the time <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[Pg 3]</a></span>he could spare and his materials "the island was +perfectly inaccessible." He expresses great disappointment, as from its +summit much could have been seen, and all doubts set aside regarding the +land he supposed he saw to westward. An extract from one of Captain De +Long's letters, making known his intention to retreat upon the Siberian +settlements in the event of disaster to the <i>Jeannette</i>, says, in +reference to a ship's being sent to obtain intelligence of him: "If the +ship comes up merely for tidings of us let her look for them on the east +side of Kellett land and on Herald island." Being in a measure guided by +this information, the <i>Corwin</i> made the forementioned places objective +points in the search. It was not, however, till after the coal bunkers +were replenished with bituminous coal from a seam in the cliff above +Cape Lisburne, that an effort was made to reach the island. During the +run westward—a distance of 245 miles—the fine weather enabled us to +witness some curious freaks of refraction and other odd phenomena for +which the high latitudes are so remarkable. On July 30, the fine weather +continuing, everybody was correspondingly elate and merry when both +Herald and Wrangel islands were sighted from the "cro'-nest" and, as +they were neared, apparently free from ice. This illusion, however, was +soon dispelled. On approaching the land strong tide rips were +encountered, and finally the ice, the drift of which was shown by the +drop of a lead-line to be west-northwest. We steamed through about +fifteen miles of this ice before being stopped, less than half a mile +from the southeast end of the island by the fixed ice, to which the ship +was secured with a kedge. We got off, and after considerable climbing +and scrambling up and down immense hummocks, and jumping a number of +crevices, finally set foot on the land <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[Pg 4]</a></span>we had been so long trying to +reach. Our advent created a great commotion among the myriads of birds +that frequent the ledges and cliffs, and the intrusion caused them to +whirl about in a motley cloud and scream at each other in ceaseless +uproar. A few minutes sufficed to survey the situation, before +attempting to ascend at a spot that seemed scarcely to afford footing +for a goat. Near the foot of the cliffs were seen on the one hand +several detached pinnacles of sombre-looking weather-worn granite that +had withstood the vigor of many Arctic winters; on the other hand a +seemingly inaccessible wall, vividly recalling the eastern face of the +Rock of Gibraltar. This sight, strange and weird beyond description, did +not fail to awaken odd thoughts and emotions, far removed as we were +from all human intercourse, amid solitude and desolation, and for a +moment the mind absorbed a dash of the local coloring. Selecting what +was believed to be the most favorable spot to ascend the cliff, two of +our party in making the attempt would occasionally detach large +bowlders, which came bounding, down like a bombardment.</p> + +<p>The attempt was abandoned after climbing a few hundred feet. In company +with several others, I tried what seemed to be a more practicable way—a +gully filled with snow—up which we had gone scarcely a hundred feet +when it, too, had to be abandoned. In the meantime the skin boat had +been brought over the ice, and one of the men pointing out another place +where he thought we might ascend, it was the work of but a few minutes +to cross a bit of open water which led to the foot of a steep snowbank, +somewhat discolored from the gravel brought down by melting snow. +Without despairing, and being in that frame of mind prepared to incur +danger to a reasonable extent for the sake of <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[Pg 5]</a></span>knowledge, we climbed +several hundred feet over the snow and ice, having to cut steps with an +axe that we had brought along, before reaching the top. The latter stage +of this proceeding was like scrambling over the dome of the Washington +Capitol with a great yawning cliff below, and was well calculated to try +the nerve of any one except a competent mountaineer or a sailor +accustomed to a doddering mast. A ravine was next reached, through which +tumbled with loud noise and wild confusion, over broken rocks and amid +some scant lichens and mosses, a stream of pure water, which had +hollowed out a shaft or funnel, forming a glacier mill or moulin. It was +over the roof of this tunnel that we had passed, and it caused an +awesome feeling to come over one to see the water leap down its mouth to +an unseen depth with a loud rumbling noise. After a tiresome ascent of +the ravine, this hitherto inaccessible island, like a standing challenge +of Nature inviting the muscular and ambitious, was at last climbed to +the very summit; and it may be remarked, with pardonable vanity, that +the feat was never done before. The view revealed from the top of the +island was a veritable apocalypse. There was something unique about the +desolate grandeur of the novel surroundings that would cause a man of +the Sir Charles Coldstream type to say there "is something in it," and +the most hackneyed man of the world would acknowledge a new sensation. +It was midnight, and the sun shone with gleaming splendor over all this +waste of ice and sea and granite; on one hand Wrangel Island appeared in +well-defined outline, on the other an open sea extended northward as far +as we were able to make out by the aid of strong glasses. From our +position about the middle of the island the two extreme points of +Wrangel island bore southwest and west-by-south respectively. In shape, +Herald island is something like a boot with a depression at the instep, +and at the westernmost extremity, near which it may be climbed with +considerable ease, are found a number of jagged peaks and splintered +pinnacles of granite, some of which resemble the giant remains of +ancient sculpture, all the worse for exposure to the weather. On a +promontory 1,400 feet high at the northeast point of the island I placed +in a cairn a bottle containing written information of our landing and a +copy of the New York <i>Herald</i> of April 23.<a name="FNanchor_1_1" id="FNanchor_1_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_1" class="fnanchor">[1]</a></p> + +<p>Beyond the extraordinary bird life, no signs of life appeared, except a +small fox, and a Polar bear. The latter put in an appearance just after +we had returned on board at three o'clock in the morning, and the +circumstances attending his slaughter, which were about as enlivening as +shooting a sheep, put an end to this episode of our mission.</p> + +<p>After great difficulty in getting out of the ice we ran all day on +Sunday, July 31, along the edge of the pack with Wrangel Island in +sight, but were unable to find a favorable lead that would take us +nearer the land than twelve or fifteen miles. The principal events that +go to make up the record of our cruise for the next ten days were the +finding of a ship's lower yard; the fabulous numbers of eider ducks seen +off the Siberian coast, and the usual encounters with fogs, bears, and +ice.</p> + +<p>On the morning of August 11, we were so near the unexplored land that we +were most sanguine about getting ashore, although it seemed as if a +journey would have first <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[Pg 6]</a></span>to be made over the ice. In the afternoon the +chances were so good that I volunteered to go ashore on the ice on the +morning of the 12th in company with Lieutenant Reynolds, Engineer Owen, +and two men. Preparations were made accordingly; the skin boat, rations, +etc., being got ready, and we spent a restless night in anticipating the +events of the coming day. We were called at five o'clock on the morning +of the 12th, and while eating a hurried breakfast the ship steamed +inshore. We were fully prepared for the undertaking; but finding the +leads in the ice more favorable than on the preceding evening, the +little steamer jammed and crashed along in a labyrinthine course not +without great difficulty, for at times she was completely beset by great +masses of ice, which she steamed against at full speed for several +minutes before they showed sign of giving way, and it seemed that all +endeavors to get out of the pack would be futile. Happily, all these +difficulties yielded, and a clear way being seen to a water hole just +off the mouth of a river, we anchored in ten fathoms near some grounded +floebergs, about a quarter of a mile off shore. A boat was then got +away, and on the calm bright morning of August 12, 1881, the first +landing on Wrangel Island was accomplished!</p> + +<p>On the beach, composed of black slaty shingle, we found the skeleton of +a whale from which the baleen was absent; also a quantity of driftwood, +some of it twelve inches in diameter; a wooden wedge; a barrel-stave; a +piece of a boat's spar and a fragment of a biscuit-box. The river, which +we named <i>Clark river</i>, was about one hundred yards wide, two fathoms +deep near the mouth, and rapid. From the top of a neighboring cliff, +four hundred feet high, it could be seen trending back into the +mountains some thirty or thirty-five miles. The moun<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[Pg 7]</a></span>tains, devoid of +snow, were seen under favorable circumstances through a rift in the +clouds, and appeared brown and naked, with smooth rounded tops. During a +tramp of some miles over a muddy way, composed of argillaceous clay and +black pebbles, I observed fragments of quartz and granite. Several +specimens containing iron pyrites were also found. The cliffs in the +vicinity of our landing are composed of slate, and the land over which I +travelled seemed almost as barren as a macadamized road; but on +searching closely several species of hyperborean plants were found, such +as saxifrages, anemones, grasses, lichens and mushrooms. The mosses and +lichens were but feebly developed, and the phanerogamous plants were in +the same state of severe repression. The following plants were +collected; and I am indebted to Professor John Muir for their names:</p> + +<ul><li><i>Saxifraga flegellaris</i>, Willd.</li> +<li class="list1"><i>stellaris</i>, L. var. <i>cornosa</i>, Poir.</li> +<li class="list1"><i>sileneflora</i>, Sternb.</li> +<li class="list1"><i>hieracifolia</i>, Waldst. & Kit.</li> +<li class="list1"><i>rivularis</i>, L. var. <i>hyperborea</i>, Hook.</li> +<li class="list1"><i>bronchialis</i>, L.</li> +<li class="list1"><i>serpyllifolia</i>, Pursh.</li> +<li><i>Anemone parviflora</i>, Michx.</li> +<li><i>Papaver nudicaule</i>, L.</li> +<li><i>Draba alpina</i>, L.</li> +<li><i>Cochleria officinalis</i>, L.</li> +<li><i>Artemisia borealis</i>, Willd.</li> +<li><i>Nardosmia frigida</i>, Hook.</li> +<li><i>Saussurea monticola</i>, Richards.</li> +<li><i>Senecio frigidus</i>, Less.</li> +<li><i>Potentilla nivea</i>, L.</li> +<li class="list1"><i>frigida</i>, Vill. ?</li> +<li><i>Armeria macrocarpa</i>, Pursh.</li> +<li class="list2"><i>vulgaris</i>, Willd.</li> +<li><i>Stellaria longipes</i>, Goldie, var. <i>Edwardsii</i>, T. & G.</li> +<li><i>Cerastium alpinum</i>, L.</li> +<li><i>Gymnandra Stelleri</i>, Cham. & Schlecht.</li> +<li><i>Salix polaris</i>, Wahl.</li> +<li><i>Luzulu hyperborea</i>, R. Br.</li> +<li><i>Poa arctica</i>, R. Br.</li> +<li><i>Aira cæspitosa</i>, L. var. <i>Arctica</i>.</li> +<li><i>Alopecurus alpinus</i>, Smith.</li></ul> + +<p>I made a collection of several spiders and of some larvæ. The spider, it +appears, is an "undescribed species of <i>Erigone</i>," and the larvæ are +probably lepidopterous. A small shrike was also secured as a specimen. +We saw several species of gulls, a snowy owl—which by the way was very +shy—a few lemmings, and the tracks of foxes and of bears.</p> + +<p>Microscopic examination of mud obtained from the bottom, in the vicinity +of our anchorage, revealed some shells of foraminifera. The density of +the sea water, and the dip of the magnetic needle were ascertained here, +as well as at other points in the Arctic; and as the observations are +entirely new, I give the results in the accompanying tables. The water +densities are from observations of Mr. F. E. Owen, Assistant Engineer of +the <i>Corwin</i>.</p> + +<p style="padding-bottom: 1em">The instruments used in obtaining the results were a thermometer and a +hydrometer. Water was drawn at about six feet below the surface and +heated to a temperature of 200° F., and the saturation, or specific +gravity is shown by the depth to which the hydrometer sank in the water. +As sea water commonly contains one part of saline matter to thirty-two +parts of water, the instrument is <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[Pg 9]</a></span>marked in thirty-seconds, as <span class="above">1</span>⁄<span class="below">32</span>, +<span class="above">2</span>⁄<span class="below">32</span>, etc., and the densities are fractional parts of one thirty-second:</p> + +<div class='center'> +<table border="0" cellpadding="4" cellspacing="0" summary=""> +<tr><th>POINTS OF OBSERVATION.</th><th>Temperature.</th><th style="border-right: 0">Density.</th></tr> +<tr><td style="border-top: 1pt black solid; text-align: left;">At Saint Michael's, Bering sea</td><td style="border-top: 1pt black solid">50</td><td style="border-top: 1pt black solid; border-right: 0">¼</td></tr> +<tr><td style="text-align: left;">Off Plover bay, Asia</td><td>34</td><td style="border-right: 0">¾</td></tr> +<tr><td style="text-align: left;">Arctic ocean, near Bering straits</td><td>32</td><td style="border-right: 0">¾</td></tr> +<tr><td style="text-align: left;">Arctic ocean, near ice on Siberian coast</td><td>32</td><td style="border-right: 0">⅝</td></tr> +<tr><td style="text-align: left;">Bering sea, off Saint Lawrence island</td><td>34</td><td style="border-right: 0">¾</td></tr> +<tr><td style="text-align: left;">Golovine bay, Bering sea, July 10</td><td>42</td><td style="border-right: 0">½</td></tr> +<tr><td style="text-align: left;">Bering sea between King's island and Cape Prince of Wales, July 12</td><td>44</td><td style="border-right: 0">¾</td></tr> +<tr><td style="text-align: left;">Entrance to Kotzebue sound, July 13</td><td>47</td><td style="border-right: 0">¾</td></tr> +<tr><td style="text-align: left;">Cape Thompson, Arctic ocean, July 17</td><td>36</td><td style="border-right: 0">¾</td></tr> +<tr><td style="text-align: left;">Icy cape, July 24</td><td>36</td><td style="border-right: 0">¾</td></tr> +<tr><td style="text-align: left;">Herald island, in the ice, July 30</td><td>31</td><td style="border-right: 0">⅝</td></tr> +<tr><td style="text-align: left;">Cape Wankarem, Siberia, August 5</td><td>33</td><td style="border-right: 0">¾</td></tr> +<tr><td style="text-align: left;">Wrangel island (surface, in ice), August 12</td><td>31</td><td style="border-right: 0">½</td></tr> +<tr><td style="border-bottom: 0.5pt black solid; text-align: left;">Wrangel island (below surface 6 feet), August 12</td><td style="border-bottom: 0.5pt black solid">31</td><td style="border-bottom: 0.5pt black solid; border-right: 0">⅝</td></tr> +</table></div> + +<p style="padding-top: 1em; padding-bottom: 1em;">The following table, showing the dip of the magnetic needle, was +prepared from observations made by Lieut. O. D. Myrick:</p> + + +<div class='center'> +<table border="0" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="0" summary=""> +<tr><th> </th><th><span class="smcap">Latitude,</span></th><th><span class="smcap">Longitude,</span></th><th style="border-right: 0"> </th></tr> +<tr><th style="border-top: 0">LOCALITY.</th><td style="padding-right: 1em; padding-left: 1em">North.<br /> Deg. Min.</td><td style="padding-right: 1em; padding-left: 1em;">West.<br /> Deg. Min.</td><td style="border-right: 0; padding-right: 1em; padding-left: 1em;"><span class="smcap">Dip.</span><br /> Deg. Min.</td></tr> +<tr><td style="border-top: 1px black solid"><span class="smcap">Alaska</span>—</td><td style="border-top: 1px black solid"> </td><td style="border-top: 1px black solid"> </td><td style="border-right: 0; border-top: 1px black solid"> </td></tr> +<tr><td style="text-align: left">Ounalaska</td><td>53 56</td><td>166 13</td><td style="border-right: 0">66 53.5</td></tr> +<tr><td style="text-align: left">St. Michael's</td><td>63 27</td><td>161 37</td><td style="border-right: 0">75 00.6</td></tr> +<tr><td style="text-align: left">Kotzebue sound</td><td>66 03</td><td>161 47</td><td style="border-right: 0">77 05.0</td></tr> +<tr><td style="text-align: left">Cape Sabine</td><td>68 50</td><td>165 10</td><td style="border-right: 0">78 47.8</td></tr> +<tr><td style="text-align: left">Icy cape</td><td>70 08</td><td>161 58</td><td style="border-right: 0">79 56.3</td></tr> +<tr><td style="text-align: left">Point Barrow</td><td>71 23</td><td>156 15</td><td style="border-right: 0">81 18.6</td></tr> +<tr><td><span class="smcap">Asia</span>—</td><td> </td><td> </td><td style="border-right: 0"> </td></tr> +<tr><td style="text-align: left">Plover bay</td><td>64 21</td><td>173 11</td><td style="border-right: 0">73 34.7</td></tr> +<tr><td style="text-align: left">Cape Wankarem</td><td>67 48</td><td>175 11</td><td style="border-right: 0">77 09.7</td></tr> +<tr><td style="text-align: left; border-bottom: 1px black solid;">Wrangel island</td><td style="border-bottom: 1px black solid;">71 04</td><td style="border-bottom: 1px black solid;">177 40</td><td style="border-right: 0; border-bottom: 1px black solid;">79 52.5</td></tr> +</table></div> + +<p style="padding-top: 1em">To commemorate our visit, a flag, placed on a pole of driftwood, was +erected on a cliff, and to the staff was secured a wide-mouthed bottle +and a tin cylinder, in which I enclosed information of our landing, etc. +On raising the flag three cheers were given, and a salute was fired from +the cutter in honor of our newly acquired territory.</p> + +<p>These evidences of our short visit, which was soon afterward +supplemented by the more extended exploration of the <i>Rodgers</i>, having +now become matters of history, it may be remarked with pardonable pride +that the acquisition of <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[Pg 11]</a></span>this remote island, though of no political or +commercial value, will serve the higher and nobler purpose of a +perpetual reminder of American enterprise, courage and maritime skill.</p> + + +<h3><span class="smcap">General Remarks on the Northern Inhabitants.</span></h3> + +<p>From an anthropological point of view the Eskimo coming under +observation proved most interesting. The term Eskimo may be held to +include all the Innuit population living on the Aleutian islands, the +islands of Bering sea, and the shores both of Asia and America north of +about latitude 64°. In this latitude on the American coast the ethnical +points that difference the North American from the Eskimo are distinctly +marked. It cannot, however, be said that the designating marks of +distinction are so plain between the American Eskimo and the so-called +Tchuktschi of the Asiatic coast. I have been unable to see anything more +in the way of distinction than exists between Englishmen and Danes, for +instance, or between Norwegians and Swedes. Indeed, it may be said that +much of the confusion and absurdity of classification found in +ethnographic literature may be traced to a tendency to see diversities +where few or none exist. To the observant man of travel who has given +the matter any attention, it seems that the most sensible classification +is that of the ancient writers who divide humanity into three races, +namely, white, yellow, and black. Cuvier adopted this division, and the +best contemporary British authority, Dr. Latham, also makes three +groups, although he varies somewhat in details from Cuvier. In +accordance with the nomenclature of Latham, the Eskimo may be spoken of +as<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[Pg 12]</a></span> Hyperborean Mongolidæ of essentially carnivorous and ichthyophagous +habits, who have not yet emerged from the hunting and fishing stage.</p> + + +<h4>PHYSICAL PECULIARITIES.</h4> + +<p>Their physical appearance and structure having been already described by +others, it is unnecessary to mention them here, except incidentally and +by way of noting a few peculiarities that seem to have been heretofore +overlooked or slightly touched upon by other writers. Although as a rule +they are of short build, averaging about five feet seven inches, yet +occasional exceptions were met with among the natives of Kotzebue sound, +many of whom are tall and of commanding appearance. At Cape Kruzenstern +a man was seen who measured six feet six inches in height. This +divergence from the conventional Eskimo type, as usually described in +the books, may have been caused by inter-marriage with an inland tribe +of larger men from the interior of Alaska, who come to the coast every +summer for purposes of trade.</p> + +<p>The complexion, rarely a true white, but rather that of a Chinaman, with +a healthy blush suffusing each cheek, is often of a brownish-yellow and +sometimes quite black, as I have seen in several instances at Tapkan, +Siberia. Nor is the broad and flat face and small nose without +exception. In the vicinity of East cape, the easternmost extremity of +Asia, a few Eskimo were seen having distinctive Hebrew noses and a +physiognomy of such a Jewish type as to excite the attention and comment +of the sailors composing our crew; others were noticed having a Milesian +cast of features and looked like Irishmen, while others resembled +several old mulatto men I know in Washington. However, the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</a></span> Mongoloid +type in these people was so pronounced that our Japanese boys on meeting +Eskimo for the first time took them for Chinamen; on the other hand the +Japs were objects of great and constant curiosity to the Eskimo, who +doubtless took them for compatriots, a fact not to be wondered at, since +there is such a similarity in the shape of the eyes, the complexion, and +hair. In regard to the latter it may be remarked that scarcely anything +on board the <i>Corwin</i> excited greater wonder and merriment among the +Eskimo than the presence of several persons whom Professor Huxley would +classify in his Xanthocroic group because of their fiery red hair.</p> + +<p>The structure and arrangement of the hair having lately been proposed as +a race characteristic upon which to base an ethnical classification, I +took pains to collect various specimens of Innuit hair, which, in +conjunction with Dr. Kidder, U. S. N., I examined microscopically and +compared with the hair of fair and blue-eyed persons, the hair of +negroes, and as a matter of curiosity with the reindeer hair and the +hair-like appendage found on the fringy extremity of the baleen plates +in the mouth of a "bowhead" whale. Some microphotographs of these +objects were made but with indifferent results.</p> + +<p>To the man willing and anxious to make more extended research into the +matter of race characteristics, I venture to say that a northern +experience will afford him ample opportunity for supplementing Mr. +Murray's paper on the Ethnological Classification of Vermin; and he may +further observe that the Eskimo, whatever may be his religious belief or +predilection, apparently observes the prohibitions of the Talmud in +regard both to filth and getting rid of noxious entomological specimens +that infest his body and habitation.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[Pg 14]</a></span></p><p>Whatever modification the bodily structure of the Eskimo may have +undergone under the influence of physical and moral causes, when viewed +in the light of transcendental anatomy, we find that the mode, plan, or +model upon which his animal frame and organs are founded is +substantially that of other varieties of men.</p> + +<p>Some writers go so far, in speaking of the Eskimo's correspondence, +mental and physical, to his surroundings as to mention the seal as his +correlative, which, in my opinion, is about as sensible as speaking of +the reciprocal relations of a Cincinnati man and a hog. Unlike the seal, +which is preëminently an amphibian and a swimmer, the Eskimo has no +physical capability of the latter kind, being unable to swim and having +the greatest aversion to water except for purposes of navigation. He +wins our admiration from the expert management at sea of his little +shuttle-shaped canoe, which is a kind of marine bicycle, but I doubt +very much the somersaults he is reported to be able to turn in them. In +fact, after offering rewards of that all-powerful incentive, tobacco, on +numerous occasions, I have been unsuccessful in getting any one of them +to attempt the feat, and when told that we had heard of their doing it +they smiled rather incredulously. The Eskimo are clearly not successes +in a cubistic or saltatorial line, as I have had ample opportunities to +observe. They seem to be unable to do the simplest gymnastics, and were +filled with the greatest delight and astonishment at some exhibitions we +gave them on several occasions. Receiving a challenge to run a foot-race +with an Eskimo, I came off easy winner, although I was handicapped by +being out of condition at the time; a challenge to throw stones also +resulted in the same kind of victory; I shouldered and carried some logs +of driftwood <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</a></span>that none of them could lift, and on another occasion the +captain and I demonstrated the physical superiority of the Anglo-Saxon +by throwing a walrus lance several lengths farther than any of the +Eskimo who had provoked the competition. As a rule they are deficient in +biceps, and have not the well-developed muscles of athletic white men. +The best muscular development I saw was among the natives of Saint +Lawrence island, who, by the way, showed me a spot in a village where +they practiced athletic sports, one of these diversions being lifting +and "putting" heavy stones, and I have frankly to acknowledge that a +young Eskimo got the better of me in a competition of this kind. It is +fair to assume that one reason for this physical superiority was the +inexorable law of the survival of the fittest, the natives in question +being the survivors of a recent prevailing epidemic and famine.</p> + + +<h4>ESKIMO APPETITES.</h4> + +<p>As far as my experience goes the Eskimo have not the enormous appetites +with which they are usually accredited. The Eskimo who accompanied +Lieutenant May, of the Nares Expedition, on his sledge journey, is +reported to have been a small eater, and the only case of scurvy, by the +way; several Eskimo who were employed on board the <i>Corwin</i> as +dog-drivers and interpreters were as a rule smaller eaters than our own +men, and I have observed on numerous occasions among the Eskimo I have +visited, that instead of being great gluttons, they are, on the +contrary, moderate eaters. It is, perhaps, the revolting character of +their food—rancid oil, a tray of hot seal entrails, a bowl of +coagulated blood, for example—that causes overestimation of the +quantity eaten. Persons in whom nausea and dis<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</a></span>gust are awakened at +tripe, putrid game, or moldy and maggoty cheese affected by so-called +epicures, not to mention the bad oysters which George I. preferred to +fresh ones, would doubtless be prejudiced and incorrect observers as to +the quantity of food an Eskimo might consume. From some acquaintance +with the subject I therefore venture to say that the popular notion +regarding the great appetite of the Eskimo is one of the current +fallacies. The reported cases were probably exceptional ones, happening +in subjects who had been exercising and living on little else than +frozen air for perhaps a week. Any vigorous man in the prime of life who +has been shooting all day in the sharp, crisp air of the Arctic will be +surprised at his gastronomic capabilities; and personal knowledge of +some almost incredible instances amongst civilized men might be related, +were it not for fear of being accused of transcending the bounds of +veracity.</p> + + +<h4>ORIGIN AND DEVELOPMENT.</h4> + +<p>There is so much about certain parts of Alaska to remind one of Scotland +that we wonder why some of the more southern Eskimo have not the +intrepidity and vigor of Scotchmen, since they live under almost the +same topographical conditions amid fogs and misty hills. Perhaps if they +were fed on oatmeal, and could be made to adopt a few of the Scotch +manners and customs, religious and otherwise, they might, after infinite +ages of evolution, develop some of the qualities of that excellent race. +It is probably not so very many generations ago that our British +progenitors were like these original and primitive men as we find them +in the vicinity of Bering straits. Here the mind is taken back over +centuries, and one is able to <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</a></span>study the link of transition between the +primitive men of the two continents at the spot where their geographical +relations lead us to suspect it. Indeed, the primitive man may be seen +just as he was thousands of years ago by visiting the village perched +like the eyry of some wild bird about 200 feet up the side of the cliff +at East cape, on the Asiatic side of the straits. This bold, rocky +cliff, rising sheer from the sea to the height of 2,100 feet, consists +of granite, with lava here and there, and the indications point to the +overflow of a vast ice sheet from the north, evidences of which are seen +in the trend of the ridges on the top, and the form of the narrow +peninsula joining the cliff to the mainland. From the summit of the cape +the Diomedes, Fairway Rock, and the American coast are so easily seen +that the view once taken would dispel any doubts as to the possibility +of the aboriginal denizens of America having crossed over from Asia, and +it would require no such statement to corroborate the opinion as that of +an officer of the Hudson Bay Company, then resident in Ungava bay, who +relates that in 1839 an Eskimo family crossed to Labrador from the +northern shore of Hudson's straits on a raft of driftwood. Natives cross +and recross Bering straits to-day on the ice and in primitive skin +canoes, not unlike Cape Cod dories, which have not been improved in +construction since the days of prehistoric man. Indeed, the primitive +man may be seen at East cape almost as he was thousands of years ago. +Evolution and development, with the exception of firearms, seem to have +halted at East cape. The place, with its cave-like dwellings and +skin-clad inhabitants, among whom the presence of white men creates the +same excitement as the advent of a circus among the colored population +of Washington, makes one <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</a></span>fancy that he is in some grand prehistoric +museum, and that he has gone backward in time several thousand years in +order to get there.</p> + +<p>While we may do something towards tracing the effects of physical agents +on the Eskimo back into the darkness that antedates history, yet his +geographical origin and his antiquity are things concerning which we +know but little. Being subjects of first-class interest, deserving of +grave study and so vast in themselves, they cannot be touched upon here +except incidentally. Attempting to study them is like following the +labyrinthal ice mazes of the Arctic in quest of the North Pole.</p> + +<p>We may, however, venture the assertion that the Eskimo is of autocthonic +origin in Asia, but is not autocthonous in America. His arrival there +and subsequent migrations are beyond the reach of history or tradition. +Others, though, contend from the analogy of some of the western tribes +of Brazil, who are identical in feature to the Chinese, that the Eskimo +may have come from South America; and the fashion of wearing labrets, +which is common to the indigenous population both of Chili and Alaska, +has been cited as a further proof.</p> + +<p>Touching the subject of early migrations, Mr. Charles Wolcott Brooks, +whose sources of information at command have been exceptionally good, +reports in a paper to the California Academy of Sciences a record of +sixty Japanese junks which were blown off the coast and by the influence +of the Kuro-Shiwo were drifted or stranded on the coast of North +America, or on the Hawaiian or adjacent islands. As merchant ships and +ships of war are known to have been built in Japan prior to the +Christian era, a great number of disabled junks containing small parties +of Japanese must <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</a></span>have been stranded on the Aleutian islands and on the +Alaskan coast in past centuries, thereby furnishing evidence of a +constant infusion of Japanese blood among the coast tribes.</p> + +<p>Leaving aside any attempt to show the ethnical relations of these facts, +the question naturally occurs whether any of these waifs ever found +their way back from the American coast. On observing the course of the +great circle of the Kuro-Shiwo and the course of the trade winds, one +inclines to the belief that such a thing is not beyond the range of +possibility. Indeed, several well-authenticated instances are mentioned +by Mr. Brooks; and in connection with the subject he advances a further +hypothesis, namely, the American origin of the Chinese race, and shows +in a plausible way that—</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>The ancestry of China may have embarked in large vessels as +emigrants, perhaps from the vicinity of the Chincha Islands, or +proceeded with a large fleet, like the early Chinese expedition +against Japan, or that of Julius Cæsar against Britain, or the +Welsh Prince Madog and his party, who sailed from Ireland and +landed in America A. D. 1170; and, in like manner, in the dateless +antecedure of history, crossed from the neighborhood of Peru to the +country now known to us as China.</p></div> + +<p>If America be the oldest continent, paleontologically speaking, as +Agassiz tells us, there appears to be some reason for looking to it as +the spot where early traces of the race are to be found, and the fact +would seem to warrant further study and investigation in connection with +the indigenous people of our continent, thereby awakening new sources of +inquiry among ethnologists.</p> + + +<h4>LINGUISTIC PECULIARITIES.</h4> + +<p>The sienite plummet from San Joaquin Valley, California, goes back to +the distant age of the Drift; and the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</a></span> Calaveras skull, admitting its +authenticity, goes back to the Pliocene epoch, and is older than the +relics or stone implements from the drift gravel and the European caves.</p> + +<p>It is doubtful, though, whether these data enable us to make +generalizations equal in value to those afforded by the study of +vocabularies. It is alleged that linguistic affinities exist between +some of the tribes of the American coast and our Oriental neighbors +across the Pacific. Mr. Brooks, whom I have already quoted, reports that +in March, 1860, he took an Indian boy on board the Japanese steam +corvette <i>Kanrin-maru</i>, where a comparison of Coast-Indian and pure +Japanese was made at his request by Funkuzawa Ukitchy, then Admiral's +secretary; the result of which he prepared for the press and published +with a view to suggesting further linguistic investigations. He says +that quite an infusion of Japanese words is found among some of the +Coast tribes of Oregon and California, either pure or clipped, along +with some very peculiar Japanese "idioms, constructions, honorific, +separative, and agglutinative particles"; that shipwrecked Japanese are +invariably enabled to communicate understandingly with the Coast +Indians, although speaking quite a different language, and that many +shipwrecked Japanese have informed him that they were enabled to +communicate with and understand the natives of Atka and Adakh islands of +the Aleutian group.</p> + +<p>With a view to finding out whether any linguistic affinity existed +between Japanese and the Eskimo dialects in the vicinity of Bering +straits, I caused several Japanese boys, employed as servants on board +the <i>Corwin</i>, to talk on numerous occasions to the natives both of the +American and Asiatic coasts; but in every instance they were unable <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</a></span>to +understand the Eskimo, and assured me that they could not detect a +single word that bore any resemblance to words in their own language.</p> + +<p>The study of the linguistic peculiarities which distinguish the +population around Bering straits offers an untrodden path in a new +field; but it is doubtful whether the results, except to linguists like +Cardinal Mezzofanti, or philologists of the Max Müller type, would be at +all commensurate with the efforts expended in this direction, since it +is asserted that the human voice is incapable of articulating more than +twenty distinct sounds, therefore whatever resemblances there may be in +the particular words of different languages are of no ethnic value. +Although these may be the views of many persons not only in regard to +the Eskimo tongue but in regard to philology in general, the matter has +a wonderful fascination for more speculative minds.</p> + +<p>Much has been said about the affinity of language among the Eskimo—some +asserting that it is such as to allow mutual intercourse everywhere—but +instances warrant us in concluding that considerable deviations exist in +their vocabularies, if not in the grammatical construction. For +instance, take two words that one hears oftener than any others: On the +Alaska coast they say "na-koo-ruk," a word meaning "good," "all right," +etc.; on the Siberian coast "mah-zink-ah," while a vocabulary collected +during Lieutenant Schwatka's expedition gives the word "mah-muk'-poo" +for "good." The first two of these words are so characteristic of the +tribes on the respective shores above the straits that a better +designation than any yet given to them by writers on the subject would +be <i>Nakoorooks</i> for the people on the American side and <i>Mazinkahs</i> for +those <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</a></span>on the Siberian coast. These names, by which they know each +other, are in general use among the whalemen and were adopted by every +one on board the <i>Corwin</i>.</p> + +<p>Again, on the American coast "Am-a-luk-tuk" signifies plenty, while on +the Siberian coast it is "Num-kuck-ee." "Tee-tee-tah" means needles in +Siberia, in Alaska it is "mitkin." In the latter place when asking for +tobacco they say "te-ba-muk," while the Asiatics say "salopa." That a +number of dialects exists around Bering straits is apparent to the most +superficial observer. The difference in the language becomes apparent +after leaving Norton sound. The interpreter we took from Saint Michael's +could only with difficulty understand the natives at Point Barrow, while +at Saint Lawrence island and on the Asiatic side he could understand +nothing at all. At East cape we saw natives who, though apparently +alike, did not understand each other's language. I saw the same thing at +Cape Prince of Wales, the western extremity of the New World, whither a +number of Eskimo from the Wankarem river, Siberia, had come to trade. +Doubtless there is a community of origin in the Eskimo tongue, and these +verbal divergencies may be owing to the want of written records to give +fixity to the language, since languages resemble living organisms by +being in a state of continual change. Be that as it may, we know that +this people has imported a number of words from coming in contact with +another language, just as the French have incorporated into their speech +"le steppeur," "l'outsider," "le high life," "le steeple chase," "le +jockey club," etc.—words that have no correlatives in French—so the +Eskimo has appropriated from the whalers words which, as verbal +expressions of his ideation, are undoubtedly better than anything in his +own <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</a></span>tongue. One of these is "by and by," which he uses with the same +frequency that a Spaniard does his favorite <i>mañana por la mañano</i>. In +this instance the words express the state of development and habits of +thought—one the lazy improvidence of the Eskimo, and the other the +"to-morrow" of the Spaniard, who has indulged that propensity so far +that his nation has become one of yesterday.</p> + +<p>The change of the Eskimo language brought about by its coming in contact +with another forms an important element in its history, and has been +mentioned by the older writers, also by Gilder, who reports a change in +the language of the Iwillik Eskimo to have taken place since the advent +among them of the white men. Among other peculiarities of their +phraseology occurs the word "tanuk," signifying whiskey, and it is said +to have originated with an old Eskimo employed by Moore as a guide and +dog-driver when he wintered in Plover bay. Every day about noon that +personage was in the habit of taking his appetizer and usually said to +the Eskimo, "Come, Joe, let's take our tonic." Like most of his +countrymen, Joe was not slow to learn the meaning of the word, and to +this day the firm hold "tanuk" has on the language is only equalled by +the thirst for the fluid which the name implies. Among the Asiatic +Eskimo the word "um-muck" is common for "rum," while "em-mik" means +water. Even words brought by whalers from the South Sea islands have +obtained a footing, such as "kow-kow" for food, a word in general use, +and "pow" for "no," or "not any." They also call their babies +"pick-a-nee-nee," which to many persons will suggest the Spanish word or +the Southern negro idiom for "baby." The phrase "pick-a-nee-nee kowkow" +is the usual formula in begging <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a></span>food for their children. An Eskimo, +having sold us a reindeer, said it would be "mazinkah kow-kow" (good +eating), and one windy day we were hauling the seine, and an Eskimo +seeing its empty condition when pulled on to the beach, said, "'Pow' +fish; bimeby 'pow' wind, plenty fish."</p> + +<p>The fluency with which some of these fellows speak a mixture of pigeon +English and whaleman's jargon is quite astonishing, and suggests the +query whether their fluency results from the aggressiveness of the +English or is it an evidence of their aptitude? It seems wonderful how a +people we are accustomed to look upon as ignorant, benighted and +undeveloped, can learn to talk English with a certain degree of fluency +and intelligibility from the short intercourse held once a year with a +few passing ships. How many "hoodlums" in San Francisco, for instance, +learn anything of Norwegian or German from frequenting the wharves? How +many "wharf rats" or stevedores in New York learn anything of these +languages from similar intercourse? Or, for that matter, we may ask, How +many New York pilots have acquired even the smallest modicum of French +from boarding the steamers of the Compagnie Générale Transatlantique?</p> + +<p>From a few examples it will be seen that the usage followed by the +Eskimo in its grammatical variations rests on the fixity of the radical +syllable and upon the agglomeration of the different particles intended +to modify the primitive sense of this root, that is to say upon the +principle of agglutinative languages. One or two instances may suffice +to show the agglutinate character of the language. Canoe is "o-me-uk;" +ship "o-me-uk-puk;" steamer "o-me-uk-puk-ignelik;" and this composite +mechanical structure <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</a></span>reaches its climax in steam-launch, which they +call "o-me-uk-puk-ignelik-pick-a-nee-nee."</p> + +<p>For snow and ice in their various forms there are also many words which +show further the polysynthetic structure of the language—a fact +contrary to that primitive condition of speech where there are no +inflections to indicate the relations of the words to each other. It +will not do to omit "O-kee-chuck" from this enumeration—a word +signifying trade, barter, or sale, and one most commonly heard among +these people. When they wish to say a thing is bad they use "A-shu-ruk," +and when disapproval is meant they say "pe-chuk." The latter word also +expresses general negation. For instance, on looking into several +unoccupied houses a native informs us "Innuit pechuk," meaning that the +people are away or not at home; "Allopar" is cold, and "allopar pechuk" +is hot. Persons fond of tracing resemblances may find in "Ignik" (fire) +a similarity to the Latin <i>ignis</i> or the English "ignite," and from +"Un-gi doo-ruk" (big, huge) the transition down to "hunky-dory" is easy. +Those who see a sort of complemental relation to each other of +linguistic affinity and the conformity in physical characters may infer +from "Mikey-doo-rook" (a term of endearment equivalent to "Mavourneen" +and used in addressing little children) that the inhabitants within the +Polar Circle have something of the Emerald Isle about them. But no, they +are not Irish, for when they are about to leave the ship or any other +place for their houses they say "to hum"; consequently they are Yankees.</p> + +<p>I do not wish to be thought frivolous in my notions regarding the noble +science of philology; but when one considers the changes that language +is constantly undergoing, the inability of the human voice to articulate +more than <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</a></span>twenty distinct sounds, and the wonderful amount of ingenious +learning that has been wasted by philologists on trifling subjects, one +is disposed to associate many of their deductions with the savage +picture-writing on Dighton Rock, the Cardiff Giant, and the old +wind-mill at Newport.</p> + + +<h4>ESKIMO DIETETICS.</h4> + +<p>Attempts to trace or discover the origin of races through supposed +philological analogies do not possess the advantage of certainty +afforded by the study of the means by which individuals of the race +supply the continuous demands of the body with the nutriment necessary +to maintain life and health.</p> + +<p>Everybody has heard of the seal, bear, walrus, and whale in connection +with Eskimo dietetics, and doubtless the stomachs of most persons would +revolt at the idea of eating these animals, the taste for which, by the +way, is merely a matter of early education or individual preference, for +there is no good reason why they should not be just as palatable to the +northern appetite as pig, sheep, and beef are to the inhabitants of +temperate latitudes. As food they renew the nitrogenous tissues, +reconstruct the parts and restore the functions of the Eskimo frame, +prolong his existence, and produce the same animal contentment and joy +as the more civilized viands of the white man's table. There are more +palatable things than bear or eider duck, yet I know many persons to +whom snails, olive oil, and <i>paté de fois gras</i> are more repugnant. A +tray full of hot seal entrails, a bowl of coagulated blood, and putrid +fish are not very inviting or lickerish to ordinary mortals, yet they +have their analogue in the dish of some farmers who eat a preparation of +pig's bowels known as "chitterlings,"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</a></span> and in the blood-puddings and +Limburger cheese of the Germans. Blubber-oil and whale are not very +dainty dishes, yet consider how many families subsist on half-baked +saleratus biscuits, salted pork, and oleomargarine.</p> + +<p>On the mess table of the Fur Company's establishment at St. Paul island, +seal meat is a daily article of consumption, and from personal +experience I can testify as to its palatability, although it reminded +one of indifferent beef rather overdone. Hair seal and bear steaks were +on different occasions tried at the mess on board the Corwin, but +everybody voted eider duck and reindeer the preference. It is not so +very long since that whale was a favorite article of diet in England and +Holland, and Arctic whalemen still, to my personal knowledge, use the +freshly tried oil in cooking; for instance in frying cakes, for which +they say it answers the purpose as well as the finest lard, while others +breakfast on whale and potatoes prepared after the manner of codfish +balls. The whale I have tasted is rather insipid eating, yet it appears +to be highly nutritious, judging from the well-nourished look of natives +who have lived on it, and the air of greasy abundance and happy +contentment that pervades an Eskimo village just after the capture of a +whale. Being ashore one day with our pilot, we met a native woman whom +he recognized as a former acquaintance, and on remarking to her that she +had picked up in flesh since he last saw her, she replied that she had +been living on a whale all the Winter, which explained her plumpness.</p> + +<p>It must not be supposed, however, that the whale, seal and walrus +constitute the entire food supply of the Arctic. There is scarcely any +more toothsome delicacy than reindeer, the tongue of which is very +dainty and succulent.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</a></span> There is one peculiarity about its flesh—in +order to have it in perfection it must be eaten very soon after being +killed; the sooner the better, for it deteriorates in flavor the longer +it is kept. Indeed, the Eskimo do not wait for the animal heat to leave +the carcass, as they eat the brains and paunch hot and smoking.</p> + +<p>While our gastronomic enthusiasm did not extend this far, we dined +occasionally on fresh trout from a Siberian mountain lake, young wild +ducks as fat as squabs, and reindeer, any of which delicacies could not +be had in the same perfection at Delmonico's or any similar +establishment in New York for love or money. There is scarcely any +better eating in the way of fish than <i>coregonus</i>—a new species +discovered at Point Barrow by the <i>Corwin</i>—and certainly no more dainty +game exists than the young wild geese and ptarmigan to be found in +countless numbers in Hotham inlet. At the latter place, doubtless the +warmest inside the straits, are found quantities of cranberries about +the size of a pea, which not only make a delicious accessory to roasted +goose, but act as a valuable antiscorbutic. These berries and a kind of +kelp, which I have seen Eskimo eating at Tapkan, Siberia, seem to be the +only vegetable food they have. The large quantities of eggs easily +procurable, but in most cases doubtful, also constitute a standard +article of diet among these people, who have no scruples about eating +them partly hatched. They seemed never to comprehend our fastidiousness +in the matter and why our tastes differed so much from theirs in this +respect. They will break an egg containing an embryonic duck or goose, +extract the bird by one leg and devour it with all the relish of an +epicure. Gull's eggs, however, are in disrepute among them, for the +women—who, by the way, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</a></span>have the same frailties and weaknesses as their +more civilized sisters—believe that eating gull's eggs causes loss of +beauty and brings on early decrepitude. The men, on the other hand, are +fond of seal eyes, a tid-bit which the women believe increases their +amorousness, and feed to their lords after the manner of "Open your +mouth and shut your eyes."</p> + +<p>Game is, as a rule, very tame, and during the moulting season, when the +geese are unable to fly, it is quite possible to kill them with a stick. +At one place, Cape Thompson, Eskimo were seen catching birds from a high +cliff with a kind of scoop-net, and I saw birds at Herald island refuse +to move when pelted with stones, so unaccustomed were they to the +presence of man. In addition to being very tame, game is plentiful, and +it is not uncommon, off the Siberian coast, to see flocks of eider ducks +darkening the air and occupying several hours in passing overhead. It +was novel sport to see the natives throw a projectile known as an +"apluketat" into one of these flocks with astonishing range and +accuracy, bringing down the game with the effectiveness of a shotgun.</p> + +<p>Game keeps so well in the Arctic that an instance is known of its being +perfectly sweet and sound on an English ship after two years' keeping, +and whalemen kill a number of pigs, which they hang in the rigging and +keep for use during the cruise. It is also noticeable that leather +articles do not mildew as they generally do at sea, some shoes kept in a +locker on board the <i>Corwin</i> having retained their polish during the +entire cruise.</p> + +<p>The food of the Eskimo satisfies their instinctive craving for a +hydrocarbon, but they do not allow themselves to be much disturbed or +distracted in its preparation, as most of <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</a></span>it is eaten raw. They +occasionally boil their food, however, and some of them have learned the +use of flour and molasses, of which they are very fond.</p> + +<p>Their aversion to salt is a very marked peculiarity, and they will not +eat either corned beef or pork on this account. It may be that +physiological reasons exist for this dislike.</p> + + +<h4>SOCIAL AND DOMESTIC RELATIONS.</h4> + +<p>Omitting other ethnographic facts relative to the Eskimo, which might be +treated in a systematic way except for their triteness, we pass from the +means of the renewal of the animal economy to its reproduction. +Courtship and marriage, which, it is said, are conducted in the most +unsentimental manner possible, are for that reason not to be discussed; +and for obvious reasons many of the prenatal conditions cannot here be +dwelt upon. Having never witnessed the act of parturition in an Eskimo +my knowledge of the subject is merely second-hand, and consequently not +worth detailing. It appears, though, that parturition is a function +easily performed among them, and that it is unattended by the +post-partum accidents common to civilization. As a rule the women are +unprolific, it being uncommon to find a family numbering over three +children, and the mortality among the new-born is excessive, owing to +the ignorance and neglect of the ordinary rules of hygiene. They seem, +however, to be kind to their children, who in respect to crying do not +show the same peevishness as seen in our nurseries; indeed, the social +and demonstrative good nature of the race seems to crop out even in +babyhood, as I have often witnessed under such circumstances as a baby +enveloped in furs in a skin canoe which lay along side the ship during a +snowstorm; its tiny hands protruding held <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[Pg 31]</a></span>a piece of blubber, which it +sucked with apparent relish, the unique picture of happy contentment. It +was quick to feel itself an object of attraction, and its chubby face +returned any number of smiles of recognition.</p> + +<p>The manner of carrying the infant is contrary to that of civilized +custom. It is borne on the back under the clothes of the mother, which +form a pouch, and from which its tiny head is generally visible over one +or the other shoulder, but on being observed by strangers it shrinks +like a snail or a marsupian into its snug retreat. When the mother wants +to remove it she bends forward, at the same time passing her left hand +up the back under her garments, and seizing the child by the feet, pulls +it downward to the left; then, passing the right hand under the front of +the dress, she again seizes the feet and extracts it by a kind of +podalic delivery. Another common way of carrying children is astride the +neck. The subject is one that the Chucki artist often carves in ivory.</p> + +<p>The play impulse manifests itself among these people in various ways. +They have such mimetic objects as dolls, miniature boats, etc. I have +seen a group of boys, sailing toy boats in a pond, behave under the +circumstances just as a similar group has been observed to do at +Provincetown, Cape Cod, and the same act, as performed in the Frog Pond +of the Boston Common, may be called only a differentiated form of the +same tendency. Their dolls, of ivory and clothed with fur, seem to +answer the same purpose that they do in civilized communities—namely, +the amusement of little girls—for at one place where we landed a number +of Eskimo girls, stopping play on our approach, sat their dolls up in a +row, evidently with a view to giving the dolls a better look at the +strange visitors. Spinning <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</a></span>tops, essentially Eskimo and unique in their +character, are held in the hand while spinning; on the Siberian coast +football is played, and among other questionable things acquired from +contact with the whalemen, a knowledge of card-playing exists. We were +very often asked for cards, and at one place where we stopped and +bartered a number of small articles with the natives they gave evidence +of their aptitude at gaming. The game being started, with the bartered +articles as stakes, one fellow soon scooped in everything, leaving the +others to go off dead-broke, amid the ridicule of some of our crew, and +doubtless feeling worse than dead, for among no people that I have seen, +not even the French, does ridicule so effectually kill.</p> + + +<h4>PERSONAL ORNAMENTATION.</h4> + +<p>Among the means taken by these people to produce personal ornamentation +that of tattooing the face and wearing a labret is the most noticeable. +The custom of tattooing having existed from the earliest historical +epochs is important, not only from an ethnological but from a medical +and pathological point of view, and even in its relation to medical +jurisprudence in cases of contested personal identity.</p> + +<p>Without going into the history of the subject, it may not be irrelevant +to mention that tattooing was condemned by the Fathers of the Church, +Tertullian, among others, who gives the following rather singular reason +for interdicting its use among women: "Certi sumus Spiritum Sanctum +magis masculis tale aliquid subscribere potuisse si feminis +subscripsisset."<a name="FNanchor_2_2" id="FNanchor_2_2"></a><a href="#Footnote_2_2" class="fnanchor">[2]</a></p> + +<p>In addition to much that has been written by French and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span> German writers, +the matter of tattoo-marks has of late claimed the attention of the law +courts of England, the Chief-Justice, Cockburn, in the Tichbourne case, +having described this species of evidence as of "vital importance," and +in itself final and conclusive. The absence of the tattoo-marks in this +case justified the jury in their finding that the defendant was not and +could not be Roger Tichbourne, whereupon the alleged claimant was proved +to be an impos<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</a></span>tor, found guilty of perjury, and sentenced to penal +servitude.<a name="FNanchor_3_3" id="FNanchor_3_3"></a><a href="#Footnote_3_3" class="fnanchor">[3]</a></p> + +<p class="figcenter"><a href="./images/illo1.png"><img src="./images/illo1_th.png" alt="Style of personal ornamentation adopted by the women of +Saint Lawrence island." title="Style of personal ornamentation adopted by the women of Saint Lawrence island." /></a></p><p class="figcenter">Style of personal ornamentation adopted +by the women of Saint Lawrence island.</p> + +<p>Why the ancient habit of tattooing should prevail so extensively among +some of the primitive tribes as it does, for instance, in the Polynesian +islands and some parts of Japan, and we may say as a survival of a +superstitious practice of paganism among sailors and others, is a +psychological problem difficult to solve. Whether it be owing to +perversion of the sexual instinct, which is not unlikely, or to other +cause, it is not proposed to discuss. Be that as it may, the prevalence +of the habit among the Eskimo is confined to the female sex, who are +tattooed on arriving at the age of puberty. The women of Saint Lawrence +island, in addition to lines on the nose, forehead and chin, have +uniformly a figure of strange design on the cheeks, which is suggestive +of cabalistic import. It could not be ascertained, however, whether such +is the case. The lines drawn on the chin were exactly like the ones I +have seen on Moorish women in Morocco. Another outlandish attempt at +adornment was witnessed at Cape Blossom in a woman who wore a bunch of +colored beads suspended from the septum of her nose. These habits, +however, hardly seem so revolting as the use of the labret by the +"Mazinka" men on the American coast, of whom it is related that a sailor +seeing one of them for the first time, and observing the slit in the +lower lip through which the native thrust his tongue, thought he had +discovered a man with two mouths. The use of the labret, like many of +the attempts at primitive ornamentation, is very old, its use having +been traced by Dall along the American coast from the lower part of +Chili <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</a></span>to Alaska. Persons fond of tracing, vestiges of savage +ornamentation amid intellectual advancement and æsthetic sensibility far +in advance of the primitive man, may observe in the wearers of bangles +and earrings the same tendency existing in a differentiated form.</p> + + +<h4>DIVERSIONS.</h4> + +<p>I doubt whether Shakespeare's dictum in regard to music holds good when +applied to the Eskimo, for they have but little music in their souls, +and among no people is there such a noticeable absence of "treason, +stratagem and spoil." A rude drum and a monotonous chant, consisting +only of the fundamental note and minor third, are the only things in the +way of music among the more remote settlements of which I have any +knowledge. Mrs. Micawber's singing has been described as the table-beer +of acoustics. Eskimo singing is something more. The beer has become flat +by the addition of ice. One of our engineers, who is quite a fiddler, +experimented on his instrument with a view to seeing what effect music +would have on the "savage breast," but his best efforts at rendering +"Madame Angot" and the "Grande Duchesse" were wasted before an +unsympathetic audience, who showed as little appreciation of his +performance as some people do when listening to Wagner's "Music of the +Future."</p> + +<p>Where they have come in contact with civilization their musical taste is +more developed. At Saint Michael's I was told that some of their songs +are so characteristic that it is much to be regretted that some of them +cannot be bottled up in a phonograph and sent to a musical composer. On +the coast of Siberia I heard an Eskimo boy sing correctly a song he had +learned while on board a whaling vessel, and <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</a></span>on several of the Aleutian +islands the natives play the accordeon quite well; have music-boxes, and +even whistle strains from "Pinafore."</p> + +<p>From music to dancing the transition is obvious, no matter whether the +latter be regarded in a Darwinian sense as a device to attract the +opposite sex or as the expression of joyous excitement. This +manifestation of feeling in its bodily discharge, which Moses and Miriam +and David indulged in, which is ranked with poetry by Aristotle, and +which old Homer says is the sweetest and most perfect of human +enjoyments, is a pastime much in vogue among the Eskimo, and it required +but little provocation to start a dance at any time on the <i>Corwin's</i> +decks when a party happened to be on board. The dancing, however, had +not the cadence of "a wave of the sea," nor was there the harmony of +double rotation circling in a series of graceful curves to strains like +those of Strauss or Gungl. On the contrary, there was something +saltatorial and jerky about all the dancing I saw both among the men and +women. It is the custom at some of their gatherings, after the hunting +season is over, for the men to indulge in a kind of terpsichorean +performance, at the same time relating in Homeric style the heroic deeds +they have done. At other times the women do all the dancing. Being +stripped to the waist they are more <i>décolleté</i> than our beauties at the +German, and the men take the part of spectators only in this +choreographical performance.</p> + + +<h4>ART INSTINCT.</h4> + +<p>The aptitude shown by Eskimo in carving and drawing has been noticed by +all travellers among them. Some I have met with show a degree of +intelligence and appreciation in regard to charts and pictures scarcely +to be expected from such a source. From walrus ivory they sculpture +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</a></span>figures of birds, quadrupeds, marine animals, and even the human form, +which display considerable individuality notwithstanding their crude +delineation and imperfect detail. I have also seen a fair carving of a +whale in plumbago. Evidences of decoration are sometimes seen on their +canoes, on which are found rude pictures of walruses, etc., and they +have a kind of picture-writing, by means of which they commemorate +certain events in their lives, just as Sitting Bull has done in an +autobiography that may be seen at the Army Medical Museum.</p> + +<p>When we were searching for the missing whalers off the Siberian coast, +some natives were come across with whom we were unable to communicate +except by signs, and wishing to let them know the object of our visit, a +ship was drawn in a note-book and shown to them, with accompanying +gesticulations, which they quickly comprehended, and one fellow, taking +the pencil and note-book, drew correctly a pair of reindeer horns on the +ship's jib-boom—a fact which identified, beyond doubt, the derelict +vessel they had seen. At Point Hope an Eskimo, who had allowed us to +take sketches of him, desired to sketch one of the party, and taking one +of our note-books and a pencil, neither of which he ever had in his hand +before, produced the accompanying likeness of Professor Muir:</p> + +<p class="figcenter"><a href="./images/illo2.png"><img src="./images/illo2_th.png" alt="" title="Drawing of Professor Muir" /></a></p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</a></span></p><p>At Saint Michael's there is an Eskimo boy who draws remarkably well, +having taught himself by copying from the <i>Illustrated London News</i>. He +made a correct pen-and-ink drawing of the <i>Corwin</i>, and another of the +group of buildings at Saint Michael's, which, though creditable in many +respects, had the defect of many Chinese pictures, being faulty in +perspective. As these drawings equal those in Dr. Rink's book, done by +Greenland artists, I regret my inability to reproduce them here. As +evidences of culture they show more advancement than the carvings of +English rustics that a clergyman has caused to be placed on exhibition +at the Kensington Museum.</p> + +<p>Sir John Ross speaks highly of his interpreter as an artist; Beechy says +that the knowledge of the coast obtained by him from Innuit maps was of +the greatest value, while Hall and others show their geographical +knowledge to be as perfect as that possible of attainment by civilized +men unaided by instruments. I had frequent opportunities to observe +these Eskimo ideas of chartography. They not only understood reading a +chart of the coast when showed to them, but would make tracings of the +unexplored part, as I knew a native to do in the case of an Alaskan +river, the mouth only of which was laid down on our chart.</p> + +<p>Manifestation of the plastic art, which is found among tribes less +intelligent, is rare among the Eskimo. In fact, the only thing of the +kind seen was some rude pottery at Saint Lawrence island, the design of +which showed but crude development of ornamental ideas. The same state +of advancement was shown in some drinking cups carved from mammoth ivory +and a dipper made from the horn of a mountain sheep.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>COMBATIVENESS.</h4> + +<p>In one of the acts of Shakespeare's "Seven Ages" the Eskimo plays a very +unimportant <i>rôle</i>. Perhaps in no other race is the combative instinct +less predominant; in none is quarrelling, fierceness of disposition, and +jealousy more conspicuously absent, and in none does the desire for the +factitious renown of war exist in a more rudimentary and undeveloped +state. Perhaps the constant fight with cold and hunger is a compensation +which must account for the absence of such unmitigated evils as war, +taxes, complex social organization and hierarchy among the curious +people of the icy north. The pursuits of peace and of simple patriarchal +lives, notwithstanding the fact of much in connection therewith that is +wretched, and forbidding to a civilized man, seem to beget in these +people a degree of domestic tranquility and contentment which, united to +their light-hearted and cheery disposition, is an additional reason for +believing the sum of human happiness to be constant throughout the +world.</p> + + +<h4>MENTAL CHARACTER AND CAPACITY.</h4> + +<p>The intellectual character of the Eskimo, judging from the information +which various travellers have furnished, as well as my personal +knowledge, produces more than a feeble belief in the possibility of +their being equal to anything they choose to take an interest in +learning. The Eskimo is not "muffled imbecility," as some one has called +him, nor is he dull and slow of understanding, as Vitruvius describes +the northern nation to be "from breathing a thick air"—which, by the +way, is thin, elastic and highly ozonized—nor is he, according to Dr. +Beke, "degenerated almost to the lowest state compatible with the +retention of <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</a></span>rational endowments." On the contrary, the old Greenland +missionary, Hans Egede, writes: "I have found some of them witty enough +and of good capacity;" Sir Martin Frobisher says they are "in nature +very subtle and sharp-witted;" Sir Edward Parry, while extolling their +honesty and good nature, adds, "Indeed, it required no long acquaintance +to convince us that art and education might easily have made them equal +or superior to ourselves;" Sauer tells of a woman who learned to speak +Russian fluently in rather less than twelve months, and Beechy and +others have acknowledged the intelligent help they have received from +Eskimo in making their explorations.</p> + +<p>Before going further, it may not be amiss to speak in a general way of +the bony covering which protects the organ whose function it is to +generate the vibrations known as thought. Of one hundred crania, +collected principally at Saint Lawrence island, a number were examined +by me at the Army Medical Museum, through the courtesy of Dr. +Huntington, with the result of changing and greatly modifying some of +the previous notions of the conventional Eskimo skull as acquired from +books on craniology. Perhaps after the inspection and examination of a +large collection of crania, it may be safe to pronounce upon their +differential character; but whether the differences in configuration are +constant or only occasional manifestations, admits of as much doubt as +the exceptions in Professor Sophocles's Greek grammar, which are often +coextensive with the rule.<a name="FNanchor_4_4" id="FNanchor_4_4"></a><a href="#Footnote_4_4" class="fnanchor">[4]</a></p> + +<p>The typical Eskimo skull, according to popular notion, is one exhibiting +a low order of intelligence, and characterized by small brain capacity, +with great prominence of the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[Pg 41]</a></span>superciliary ridges, occipital +protuberance and zygomatic arches, the latter projecting beyond the +general contour of the skull like the handles of a jar or a peach +basket; and lines drawn from the most projecting part of the arches and +touching the sides of the frontal bone are supposed to meet over the +forehead, forming a triangle, for which reason the skull is known as +pyramidal.</p> + +<p>The first specimen, examined from a vertical view, shows something of +the typical character as figured in A, and when viewed posteriorly there +is noticed a flattening of the parietal walls with an elongated vertex +as shown in D; while a second specimen, represented by B, shows none of +the foregoing characteristics, the form being elongated and the parietal +walls so far overhanging as to conceal the zygomatic arches in the +vertical view, so that if lines be drawn as previously mentioned, +instead of forming a triangle they may, like the asymptotes of a +parabola, be extended to infinity and never meet.</p> + +<p>For purposes of comparison a number of orthographic outlines, showing +the contour of civilized crania, from a vertical point of observation, +are herewith annexed. No. 1 is that of an eminent mathematician who +committed suicide; No. 2, a prominent politician during the civil war; +No. 3, a banker; and No. 4, a notorious assassin. Nos. 5 and 6 are negro +skulls. Further comparison may be made with the Jewish skull, as +represented in No. 7, in which the nasal bones project so far beyond the +general contour as to form a bird-like appendage.</p> + + +<div class='center'> +<table border="0" cellpadding="4" cellspacing="0" summary=""> +<tr><td style="border-right: 0"><p class="figcenter"><a href="./images/illo3.png"><img src="./images/illo3_th.png" alt="Figure A" title="Figure A" /></a></p><p class="figcenter">Figure A</p></td> +<td style="border-right: 0"><p class="figcenter"><a href="./images/illo4.png"><img src="./images/illo4_th.png" alt="Figure B" title="Figure B" /></a></p><p class="figcenter">Figure B</p></td></tr> +<tr><td style="border-right:0"><p class="figcenter"><a href="./images/illo5.png"><img src="./images/illo5_th.png" alt="Figure C" title="Figure C" /></a></p><p class="figcenter">Figure C</p></td> +<td style="border-right: 0"><p class="figcenter"><a href="./images/illo6.png"><img src="./images/illo6_th.png" alt="Figure D" title="Figure D" /></a></p><p class="figcenter">Figure D</p></td></tr> +</table></div> + +<p>A collection of Aleutian heads, as seen from a vertical point of +observation, when I looked down from the gallery of the little Greek +church at Ounalaska, presented at first <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[Pg 44]</a></span><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</a></span><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</a></span>certain collective characters +by which they approach one another. But anatomists know that a careful +comparison of any collection will show extremely salient differences. In +fact, individual differences, so numerous and so irregular as to prevent +methodical enumeration, constitute the stumbling-block of ethnic +craniology. Take, for instance, a number of the skulls under +consideration: in proportions they will be found to present very +considerable variations among themselves. The skulls figured by A and B +are respectively brachycephalic and dolichocephalic. The former has an +internal capacity of 1,400, the latter 1,214 cubic centimeters; but the +facial angle of each is 80°, and in one Eskimo cranium it runs up to +84°. If the facial <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[Pg 45]</a></span>angle be trustworthy, as a measure of the degree of +intelligence, we have shown here a development far in excess of the +negro, which is placed at 70°, or of the Mongolian at 75°, and exceeding +that observed by me in many German skulls, which do not, as a rule, come +up to the 90° of Jupiter Tonans or of Cuvier, in spite of the boasted +intelligence of that nationality.</p> + + +<div class='center'> +<table border="0" cellpadding="4" cellspacing="0" summary=""> +<tr><td style="border-right: 0"><p class="figcenter"><a href="./images/illo7.png"><img src="./images/illo7_th.png" alt="Illustration No. 1." title="Illustration No. 1." /></a></p><p class="figcenter">Illustration No. 1.</p></td> +<td style="border-right: 0"><p class="figcenter"><a href="./images/illo8.png"><img src="./images/illo8_th.png" alt="Illustration No. 2." title="Illustration No. 2." /></a></p><p class="figcenter">Illustration No. 2.</p></td> +<td style="border-right: 0"><p class="figcenter"><a href="./images/illo9.png"><img src="./images/illo9_th.png" alt="Illustration No. 3." title="Illustration No. 3." /></a></p><p class="figcenter">Illustration No. 3.</p></td></tr> +<tr><td style="border-right: 0"><p class="figcenter"><a href="./images/illo10.png"><img src="./images/illo10_th.png" alt="Illustration No. 4." title="Illustration No. 4." /></a></p><p class="figcenter">Illustration No. 4.</p></td> +<td style="border-right: 0"><p class="figcenter"><a href="./images/illo11.png"><img src="./images/illo11_th.png" alt="Illustration No. 5." title="Illustration No. 5." /></a></p><p class="figcenter">Illustration No. 5.</p></td> +<td style="border-right: 0"><p class="figcenter"><a href="./images/illo12.png"><img src="./images/illo12_th.png" alt="Illustration No. 6." title="Illustration No. 6." /></a></p><p class="figcenter">Illustration No. 6.</p></td></tr> +</table></div> + +<p>In none of the skulls of the collection is there observable the heavy +superciliary ridges alleged to be common in lower races, but which exist +in many of the best-formed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[Pg 46]</a></span> European crania—shall we say as anomalies +or as individual variations? Nor is the convexity of the squamo-parietal +suture such as characterizes the low-typed cranium of the chimpanzee or +the Mound Builder. On the contrary, the orbits are cleanly made and the +suture is well curved. Besides, a low degree of intelligence is not +shown by observing the index of the foramen magnum, which is about the +same as that found in European crania; and the same may be said of the +internal capacity of the cranium. To illustrate the latter remark is +appended a tabular statement made up from Welcker, Broca, Aitken and +Meigs:</p> + +<div class='center'> +<table border="0" cellpadding="4" cellspacing="0" summary=""> +<tr><td style="border-right: 0"> </td><td style="border-right: 0">Cubic centimeters.</td></tr> +<tr><td style="padding-right: 10em; text-align: left; border-right: 0">Australian</td><td style="border-right: 0">1,228</td></tr> +<tr><td style="padding-right: 10em; text-align: left; border-right: 0">Polynesian</td><td style="border-right: 0">1,230</td></tr> +<tr><td style="padding-right: 10em; text-align: left; border-right: 0">Hottentot</td><td style="border-right: 0">1,230</td></tr> +<tr><td style="padding-right: 10em; text-align: left; border-right: 0">Mexican</td><td style="border-right: 0">1,296</td></tr> +<tr><td style="padding-right: 10em; text-align: left; border-right: 0">Malay</td><td style="border-right: 0">1,328</td></tr> +<tr><td style="padding-right: 10em; text-align: left; border-right: 0">Ancient Peruvian</td><td style="border-right: 0">1,361</td></tr> +<tr><td style="padding-right: 10em; text-align: left; border-right: 0">French</td><td style="border-right: 0">1,403 to 1,461</td></tr> +<tr><td style="padding-right: 10em; text-align: left; border-right: 0">German</td><td style="border-right: 0">1,448</td></tr> +<tr><td style="padding-right: 10em; text-align: left; border-right: 0">English</td><td style="border-right: 0">1,572</td></tr> +</table></div> + +<p>An average of the Eskimo skull, some of which measure as much as 1,650 +and 1,715 c. c., will show the brain capacity to be the same as that of +the French or of the Germans. None of them, however, approaches the +anomalous capacities of two Indian skulls on exhibition at the Army +Medical Museum, one of which shows 1,785 c. c., and the other the +unprecedented measurement of 1,920 c. c.</p> + +<p>If the foregoing means for estimating the mental grasp and capacity for +improvement be correct, then we must accord to the most northern nation +of the globe a fair <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[Pg 47]</a></span>degree of brain energy—potential though it be. +Aside from the mere physical methods of determining the degree of +intelligence, it is urged by some writers, among them the historian +Robertson, that tact in commerce and correct ideas of property are +evidence of a considerable progress toward civilization. The natural +inference from this is that they are tests of intellectual power, since +mind is a combination of all the actual and possible states of +consciousness of the organism, and an examination of the Eskimo system +of trade draws its own conclusion. Their fondness for trade has been +known for a long time, as well as the extended range of their commercial +intercourse. They trade with the Indians, with the fur companies, the +whalers and among themselves across Bering straits. Many of them are +veritable Shylocks, having a through comprehension of the axiom in +political economy regarding the regulation of the price of a thing by +the demand.</p> + +<p class="figcenter"><a href="./images/illo13.png"><img src="./images/illo13_th.png" alt="Illustration No. 7." title="Illustration No. 7" /></a></p><p class="figcenter">Illustration No. 7.</p> + +<h4>THE MORAL SENSE AND THE RELIGIOUS INSTINCT.</h4> + +<p>With the aptitudes and instincts of our common humanity Eskimo morals, +as manifested in truth, right and virtue, also admit of remark. Except +where these people have had the bad example of the white man, whose +vices they have imitated, not on account of defective moral nature, but +because they saw few or no virtues, they are models of truthfulness and +honesty. In fact their virtues in this respect are something phenomenal. +The same cannot be said, however, for their sexual morals, which, as a +rule, are the contrary of good. Even a short stay among the hyperboreans +causes one to smile at Lord Kames's "frigidity of the North Americans," +and at the fallacy of Herder who says, "the blood of man near the pole +circulates but slowly, the heart beats but languidly; consequently the +married live chastely, the women almost require compulsion to take upon +them the troubles of a married life," etc. Nearly the same idea +expressed by Montesquieu, and repeated by Byron in "happy the nations of +the moral North," are statements so at variance with our experience that +this fact must alone excuse a reference to the subject. So far are they +from applying to the people in question that it is only necessary to +mention, without going into detail, that the women are freely offered to +strangers by way of hospitality, showing a decided preference for white +men, whom they believe to beget better offspring than their own men. In +this regard one is soon convinced that salacious and prurient tastes are +not the exclusive privilege of people living outside of the Arctic +Circle; and observation favors the belief in the existence of pederasty +among Eskimo, if one may be allowed to judge from circumstances, which +it is not necessary to particularize, and from a word in their language +signifying the act.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[Pg 49]</a></span></p><p>Since morality is the last virtue acquired by man and the first one he +is likely to lose, it is not so surprising to find outrages on morals +among the undeveloped inhabitants of the north as it is to find them in +intelligent Christian communities among people whose moral sense ought +to be far above that of the average primitive man in view of their +associations and the variations that have been so frequently repeated +and accumulated by heredity; and where there is no hierarchy nor +established missionaries it is still more surprising to find any moral +sense at all among a people whose vague religious belief does not extend +beyond Shamanism or Animism, which to them explains the more strange and +striking natural phenomena by the hypothesis of direct spiritual agency.</p> + +<p>It must not be understood by this, however, that these people have no +religion, as many travellers have erroneously believed; that would be +almost equivalent to stating that races of men exist without speech, +memory or knowledge of fire. A purely ethnological view of religion +which regards it as "the feeling which falls upon man in the presence of +the unknown," favors the idea that the children of the icy north have +many of the same feelings in this respect as those experienced by +ourselves under similar conditions, although there is doubtless a change +in us produced by more advanced thought and nicer feeling. On the other +hand, how many habits and ideas that are senseless and perfectly +unexplainable by the light of our present modes of life and thought can +be explained by similar customs and prejudices existing among these +distant tribes. Is there no fragment of primitive superstition or +residue of bygone ages in the supposed influence of the "Evil Eye" in +Ireland, or in the habit of "telling the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[Pg 50]</a></span>bees" in Germany? Is there not +something of intellectual fossildom in the popular notion about Friday +and thirteen at table, and in the ancient rite of exorcising oppressed +persons, houses and other places supposed to be haunted by unwelcome +spirits, the form of which is still retained in the Roman ritual? And is +not our enlightened America "the land of spiritualists, mesmerism, +soothsaying and mystical congregations"?</p> + +<p>When the native of Saint Michael's invokes the moon, or the native of +Point Barrow his crude images previously to hunting the seal, in order +to bring good luck, is not the mental and emotional impulse the same as +that which actuates more civilized men to look upon "outward signs of an +inward and spiritual grace," or not to start upon any important +undertaking without first invoking the blessing of Deity? And are not +the rites observed by the natives on the Siberian coast, when the first +walrus is caught, the counterpart of our Puritan Thanksgiving Day?</p> + +<p>Perhaps the untutored Eskimo has the same fear of the dangerous and +terrible, the unknown, the infinite, as ourselves, and parts with life +just as reluctantly: but it cannot be said that our observation favors +the fact of his longevity, although long life seems to prevail among +some of the circumpolar tribes, the Laps, for instance, who, according +to Scheffer, in spite of hard lives enjoy good health, are long-lived, +and still alert at eighty and ninety years.—(De Medecina Laponum.)</p> + +<p>Owing to his hard life, the conflict with his circumstances and his want +of foresight, the Eskimo soon becomes a physiological bankrupt, and his +stock of vitality being exhausted, his bodily remains are covered with +stones, around which are placed wooden masks and articles that <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[Pg 51]</a></span>have +been useful to him during life, as I have seen at Nounivak island, or +they are covered with driftwood as observed in Kotzebue sound, or as at +Tapkan, Siberia, where the corpse is lashed to a long pole and is taken +some distance from the village, when the clothes are stripped off, +placed on the ground and covered with stones. The cadaver is then +exposed in the open air to the tender mercies of crows, foxes and +wolves. The weapons and other personal effects of the decedent are +placed near by, probably with something of the same sentiment that +causes us to use chaplets of flowers and immortelles as funeral +offerings—a custom that Schiller has commemorated in "Bringet hier die +letzen Gaben."</p> + +<p>The future destiny of these people is a question in which the theologian +and politician are not less interested than the man of science. Some +observers seem to think that their numbers are diminishing under the +evil influence of so-called civilization. But as every race participates +in the same moral nature, and the entire history of humanity, according +to Herder, is a series of events pointing to a higher destiny than has +yet been revealed, there is no reason why the sum of human happiness, +under proper auspices, should not be increased among the Innuit race. +Arch-deacon Kirkby, a Church of England clergyman who has lately visited +them in a missionary capacity as far as Boothia, speaks in the highest +terms of their intelligence and capacity for improvement. Here, then, is +a brilliant opportunity for some one full of propagandism and charity to +repeat the acts of the modern apostles and extend the influence of +civilization to the gay, lively, curious and talkative hyperboreans +whose home is under the midnight sun and on the borders of the Icy Sea.</p> + +<p class="caption">Journal, American Geographical Society, Vol. XV, 1883. Bulletin Nº. 3. Rosse.</p> + +<p class="figcenter"><a href="./images/illo14.png"><img src="./images/illo14_th.png" alt="WRANGEL ISLAND" title="WRANGEL ISLAND" /></a></p><p class="figcenter">WRANGEL ISLAND</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_1_1" id="Footnote_1_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_1"><span class="label">[1]</span></a> In November, 1882, while in London, I met Mr. Gilder, the +<i>Herald</i> correspondent, who accompanied the U. S. ship <i>Rodgers</i>, and he +showed me this record and paper which he had taken from the cairn during +a subsequent visit to the island.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_2_2" id="Footnote_2_2"></a><a href="#FNanchor_2_2"><span class="label">[2]</span></a> De Virginibus velandis. Lutetiæ Parisiorum. 1675 fº., p. +178.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_3_3" id="Footnote_3_3"></a><a href="#FNanchor_3_3"><span class="label">[3]</span></a> See Guy's Hospital Report, XIX, 1874; also "Histoire +Médicale du Tatouage," in Archives de Médecine Navale, Tom. 11 and 12, +Paris, 1869.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_4_4" id="Footnote_4_4"></a><a href="#FNanchor_4_4"><span class="label">[4]</span></a> Retzius, Finska Kranier, Stockholm: 1878.</p></div> +</div> + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The First Landing on Wrangel Island, by +Irving C. 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Rosse + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The First Landing on Wrangel Island + With Some Remarks on the Northern Inhabitants + +Author: Irving C. Rosse + +Release Date: June 21, 2006 [EBook #18643] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE FIRST LANDING ON WRANGEL *** + + + + +Produced by A www.pgdp.net Volunteer, Irma Spehar and the +Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net +(This file was produced from images generously made +available by the Canadian Institute for Historical +Microreproductions (www.canadiana.org)) + + + + + +THE FIRST LANDING ON WRANGEL ISLAND, + +WITH SOME + +REMARKS ON THE NORTHERN INHABITANTS. + +BY + +IRVING C. ROSSE, M.D. + +On May 4, 1881, through the courtesy of the Chief of Revenue Marine, Mr. +E.W. Clark, I was allowed to take passage from San Francisco, Cal., on +board the United States Revenue steamer _Corwin_, whose destination was +Alaska and the northwest Arctic ocean. The object of the cruise was, in +addition to revenue duty, to ascertain the fate of two missing whalers +and, if possible, to communicate with the Arctic exploring yacht +_Jeannette_. + +Our well-found craft made good headway for seven or eight uneventful +days of exceptionally fine weather, while the ocean, somewhat deserving +the adjective that designates it, displayed its prettiest combinations +of blue tints and sunset effects as we steamed through miles of +medusidae; and had it not been for the sight of occasional whales and the +strange marine birds that characterize a higher latitude, we should +scarcely have known of our approach to the north. Soon, however, we were +beset by pelting hail and furious storms of snow and all the discomforts +of sea life, causing a _penible navigation_ in every sense of the term. +On May 15 we were somewhat disoriented while trying to make a landfall +in a blinding snowstorm, and groped about for several hours before +anchoring under one of the Alp-like cliffs of the Aleutian islands. + + * * * * * + +Without going into further details of the cruise, I will state that on +the previous year five unsuccessful attempts were made by the _Corwin_ +to reach Herald island, and that Wrangel island was approached to within +about twenty miles. This "problematical northern land," the existence of +which the Russian Admiral Wrangel reported from accounts of Siberian +natives, and which he tried unsuccessfully to find; a land that Captain +Kellett, of Her Britannic Majesty's ship _Herald_, in 1849, thought he +saw, but which, under more favorable circumstances of weather and +position, was not seen by the United States ship _Vincennes_; a land, in +fact, that from the foregoing statements and from the imperfect accounts +of whalemen we had begun to regard as a myth, was actually seen; and I +shall never forget the tinge of regret I felt when the necessity of the +position obliged the withdrawal of the ship and I took a last lingering +look at the ice-bound and unexplored coast, fully realizing at the time +the joyous satisfaction that must animate the discoverer and explorer of +an unknown land. + +However, better luck was in store; for Captain Kellett's discovery was +afterwards completed by the _Corwin_. I now purpose to narrate a few +circumstances attending this first landing on Wrangel island, which may +be best told by further reference to Herald island. Captain Kellett, the +only person known to have landed at the latter place previously to this +account, reports that the extent he had to walk over was not more than +thirty feet, from which space he scrambled up a short distance; that +with the time he could spare and his materials "the island was +perfectly inaccessible." He expresses great disappointment, as from its +summit much could have been seen, and all doubts set aside regarding the +land he supposed he saw to westward. An extract from one of Captain De +Long's letters, making known his intention to retreat upon the Siberian +settlements in the event of disaster to the _Jeannette_, says, in +reference to a ship's being sent to obtain intelligence of him: "If the +ship comes up merely for tidings of us let her look for them on the east +side of Kellett land and on Herald island." Being in a measure guided by +this information, the _Corwin_ made the forementioned places objective +points in the search. It was not, however, till after the coal bunkers +were replenished with bituminous coal from a seam in the cliff above +Cape Lisburne, that an effort was made to reach the island. During the +run westward--a distance of 245 miles--the fine weather enabled us to +witness some curious freaks of refraction and other odd phenomena for +which the high latitudes are so remarkable. On July 30, the fine weather +continuing, everybody was correspondingly elate and merry when both +Herald and Wrangel islands were sighted from the "cro'-nest" and, as +they were neared, apparently free from ice. This illusion, however, was +soon dispelled. On approaching the land strong tide rips were +encountered, and finally the ice, the drift of which was shown by the +drop of a lead-line to be west-northwest. We steamed through about +fifteen miles of this ice before being stopped, less than half a mile +from the southeast end of the island by the fixed ice, to which the ship +was secured with a kedge. We got off, and after considerable climbing +and scrambling up and down immense hummocks, and jumping a number of +crevices, finally set foot on the land we had been so long trying to +reach. Our advent created a great commotion among the myriads of birds +that frequent the ledges and cliffs, and the intrusion caused them to +whirl about in a motley cloud and scream at each other in ceaseless +uproar. A few minutes sufficed to survey the situation, before +attempting to ascend at a spot that seemed scarcely to afford footing +for a goat. Near the foot of the cliffs were seen on the one hand +several detached pinnacles of sombre-looking weather-worn granite that +had withstood the vigor of many Arctic winters; on the other hand a +seemingly inaccessible wall, vividly recalling the eastern face of the +Rock of Gibraltar. This sight, strange and weird beyond description, did +not fail to awaken odd thoughts and emotions, far removed as we were +from all human intercourse, amid solitude and desolation, and for a +moment the mind absorbed a dash of the local coloring. Selecting what +was believed to be the most favorable spot to ascend the cliff, two of +our party in making the attempt would occasionally detach large +bowlders, which came bounding, down like a bombardment. + +The attempt was abandoned after climbing a few hundred feet. In company +with several others, I tried what seemed to be a more practicable way--a +gully filled with snow--up which we had gone scarcely a hundred feet +when it, too, had to be abandoned. In the meantime the skin boat had +been brought over the ice, and one of the men pointing out another place +where he thought we might ascend, it was the work of but a few minutes +to cross a bit of open water which led to the foot of a steep snowbank, +somewhat discolored from the gravel brought down by melting snow. +Without despairing, and being in that frame of mind prepared to incur +danger to a reasonable extent for the sake of knowledge, we climbed +several hundred feet over the snow and ice, having to cut steps with an +axe that we had brought along, before reaching the top. The latter stage +of this proceeding was like scrambling over the dome of the Washington +Capitol with a great yawning cliff below, and was well calculated to try +the nerve of any one except a competent mountaineer or a sailor +accustomed to a doddering mast. A ravine was next reached, through which +tumbled with loud noise and wild confusion, over broken rocks and amid +some scant lichens and mosses, a stream of pure water, which had +hollowed out a shaft or funnel, forming a glacier mill or moulin. It was +over the roof of this tunnel that we had passed, and it caused an +awesome feeling to come over one to see the water leap down its mouth to +an unseen depth with a loud rumbling noise. After a tiresome ascent of +the ravine, this hitherto inaccessible island, like a standing challenge +of Nature inviting the muscular and ambitious, was at last climbed to +the very summit; and it may be remarked, with pardonable vanity, that +the feat was never done before. The view revealed from the top of the +island was a veritable apocalypse. There was something unique about the +desolate grandeur of the novel surroundings that would cause a man of +the Sir Charles Coldstream type to say there "is something in it," and +the most hackneyed man of the world would acknowledge a new sensation. +It was midnight, and the sun shone with gleaming splendor over all this +waste of ice and sea and granite; on one hand Wrangel Island appeared in +well-defined outline, on the other an open sea extended northward as far +as we were able to make out by the aid of strong glasses. From our +position about the middle of the island the two extreme points of +Wrangel island bore southwest and west-by-south respectively. In shape, +Herald island is something like a boot with a depression at the instep, +and at the westernmost extremity, near which it may be climbed with +considerable ease, are found a number of jagged peaks and splintered +pinnacles of granite, some of which resemble the giant remains of +ancient sculpture, all the worse for exposure to the weather. On a +promontory 1,400 feet high at the northeast point of the island I placed +in a cairn a bottle containing written information of our landing and a +copy of the New York _Herald_ of April 23.[1] + +Beyond the extraordinary bird life, no signs of life appeared, except a +small fox, and a Polar bear. The latter put in an appearance just after +we had returned on board at three o'clock in the morning, and the +circumstances attending his slaughter, which were about as enlivening as +shooting a sheep, put an end to this episode of our mission. + +After great difficulty in getting out of the ice we ran all day on +Sunday, July 31, along the edge of the pack with Wrangel Island in +sight, but were unable to find a favorable lead that would take us +nearer the land than twelve or fifteen miles. The principal events that +go to make up the record of our cruise for the next ten days were the +finding of a ship's lower yard; the fabulous numbers of eider ducks seen +off the Siberian coast, and the usual encounters with fogs, bears, and +ice. + +On the morning of August 11, we were so near the unexplored land that we +were most sanguine about getting ashore, although it seemed as if a +journey would have first to be made over the ice. In the afternoon the +chances were so good that I volunteered to go ashore on the ice on the +morning of the 12th in company with Lieutenant Reynolds, Engineer Owen, +and two men. Preparations were made accordingly; the skin boat, rations, +etc., being got ready, and we spent a restless night in anticipating the +events of the coming day. We were called at five o'clock on the morning +of the 12th, and while eating a hurried breakfast the ship steamed +inshore. We were fully prepared for the undertaking; but finding the +leads in the ice more favorable than on the preceding evening, the +little steamer jammed and crashed along in a labyrinthine course not +without great difficulty, for at times she was completely beset by great +masses of ice, which she steamed against at full speed for several +minutes before they showed sign of giving way, and it seemed that all +endeavors to get out of the pack would be futile. Happily, all these +difficulties yielded, and a clear way being seen to a water hole just +off the mouth of a river, we anchored in ten fathoms near some grounded +floebergs, about a quarter of a mile off shore. A boat was then got +away, and on the calm bright morning of August 12, 1881, the first +landing on Wrangel Island was accomplished! + +On the beach, composed of black slaty shingle, we found the skeleton of +a whale from which the baleen was absent; also a quantity of driftwood, +some of it twelve inches in diameter; a wooden wedge; a barrel-stave; a +piece of a boat's spar and a fragment of a biscuit-box. The river, which +we named _Clark river_, was about one hundred yards wide, two fathoms +deep near the mouth, and rapid. From the top of a neighboring cliff, +four hundred feet high, it could be seen trending back into the +mountains some thirty or thirty-five miles. The mountains, devoid of +snow, were seen under favorable circumstances through a rift in the +clouds, and appeared brown and naked, with smooth rounded tops. During a +tramp of some miles over a muddy way, composed of argillaceous clay and +black pebbles, I observed fragments of quartz and granite. Several +specimens containing iron pyrites were also found. The cliffs in the +vicinity of our landing are composed of slate, and the land over which I +travelled seemed almost as barren as a macadamized road; but on +searching closely several species of hyperborean plants were found, such +as saxifrages, anemones, grasses, lichens and mushrooms. The mosses and +lichens were but feebly developed, and the phanerogamous plants were in +the same state of severe repression. The following plants were +collected; and I am indebted to Professor John Muir for their names: + +_Saxifraga flegellaris_, Willd. + _stellaris_, L. var. _cornosa_, Poir. + _sileneflora_, Sternb. + _hieracifolia_, Waldst. & Kit. + _rivularis_, L. var. _hyperborea_, Hook. + _bronchialis_, L. + _serpyllifolia_, Pursh. +_Anemone parviflora_, Michx. +_Papaver nudicaule_, L. +_Draba alpina_, L. +_Cochleria officinalis_, L. +_Artemisia borealis_, Willd. +_Nardosmia frigida_, Hook. +_Saussurea monticola_, Richards. +_Senecio frigidus_, Less. +_Potentilla nivea_, L. + _frigida_, Vill. ? +_Armeria macrocarpa_, Pursh. + _vulgaris_, Willd. +_Stellaria longipes_, Goldie, var. _Edwardsii_, T. & G. +_Cerastium alpinum_, L. +_Gymnandra Stelleri_, Cham. & Schlecht. +_Salix polaris_, Wahl. +_Luzulu hyperborea_, R. Br. +_Poa arctica_, R. Br. +_Aira caespitosa_, L. var. _Arctica_. +_Alopecurus alpinus_, Smith. + +I made a collection of several spiders and of some larvae. The spider, it +appears, is an "undescribed species of _Erigone_," and the larvae are +probably lepidopterous. A small shrike was also secured as a specimen. +We saw several species of gulls, a snowy owl--which by the way was very +shy--a few lemmings, and the tracks of foxes and of bears. + +Microscopic examination of mud obtained from the bottom, in the vicinity +of our anchorage, revealed some shells of foraminifera. The density of +the sea water, and the dip of the magnetic needle were ascertained here, +as well as at other points in the Arctic; and as the observations are +entirely new, I give the results in the accompanying tables. The water +densities are from observations of Mr. F.E. Owen, Assistant Engineer of +the _Corwin_. + +The instruments used in obtaining the results were a thermometer and a +hydrometer. Water was drawn at about six feet below the surface and +heated to a temperature of 200 deg. F., and the saturation, or specific +gravity is shown by the depth to which the hydrometer sank in the water. +As sea water commonly contains one part of saline matter to thirty-two +parts of water, the instrument is marked in thirty-seconds, as 1/32, +2/32, etc., and the densities are fractional parts of one thirty-second: + +--------------------------------------------------------------------- +POINTS OF OBSERVATION. Temperature. Density. +--------------------------------------------------------------------- + +At Saint Michael's, Bering sea 50 1/4 + +Off Plover bay, Asia 34 3/4 + +Arctic ocean, near Bering straits 32 3/4 + +Arctic ocean, near ice on Siberian coast 32 5/8 + +Bering sea, off Saint Lawrence island 34 3/4 + +Golovine bay, Bering sea, July 10 42 1/2 + +Bering sea between King's island and Cape Prince + of Wales, July 12 44 3/4 + +Entrance to Kotzebue sound, July 13 47 3/4 + +Cape Thompson, Arctic ocean, July 17 36 3/4 + +Icy cape, July 24 36 3/4 + +Herald island, in the ice, July 30 31 3/8 + +Cape Wankarem, Siberia, August 5 33 3/4 + +Wrangel island (surface, in ice), August 12 31 1/2 + +Wrangel island (below surface 6 feet), August 12 31 5/8 + +--------------------------------------------------------------------- + +The following table, showing the dip of the magnetic needle, was +prepared from observations made by Lieut. O.D. Myrick: + +---------------------+------------+------------+----------- + | LATITUDE, | LONGITUDE, | + | North. | West. | DIP. +LOCALITY. | Deg. Min. | Deg. Min. | Deg. Min. +---------------------+------------+------------+----------- +ALASKA-- | | | + Ounalaska | 53 56 | 166 13 | 66 53.5 + St. Michael's | 63 27 | 161 37 | 75 00.6 + Kotzebue sound | 66 03 | 161 47 | 77 05.0 + Cape Sabine | 68 50 | 165 10 | 78 47.8 + Icy cape | 70 08 | 161 58 | 79 56.3 + Point Barrow | 71 23 | 156 15 | 81 18.6 + | | | +ASIA-- | | | + Plover bay | 64 21 | 173 11 | 73 34.7 + Cape Wankarem | 67 48 | 175 11 | 77 09.7 + Wrangel island | 71 04 | 177 40 | 79 52.5 +---------------------+------------+------------+----------- + +To commemorate our visit, a flag, placed on a pole of driftwood, was +erected on a cliff, and to the staff was secured a wide-mouthed bottle +and a tin cylinder, in which I enclosed information of our landing, etc. +On raising the flag three cheers were given, and a salute was fired from +the cutter in honor of our newly acquired territory. + +These evidences of our short visit, which was soon afterward +supplemented by the more extended exploration of the _Rodgers_, having +now become matters of history, it may be remarked with pardonable pride +that the acquisition of this remote island, though of no political or +commercial value, will serve the higher and nobler purpose of a +perpetual reminder of American enterprise, courage and maritime skill. + + +GENERAL REMARKS ON THE NORTHERN INHABITANTS. + +From an anthropological point of view the Eskimo coming under +observation proved most interesting. The term Eskimo may be held to +include all the Innuit population living on the Aleutian islands, the +islands of Bering sea, and the shores both of Asia and America north of +about latitude 64 deg.. In this latitude on the American coast the ethnical +points that difference the North American from the Eskimo are distinctly +marked. It cannot, however, be said that the designating marks of +distinction are so plain between the American Eskimo and the so-called +Tchuktschi of the Asiatic coast. I have been unable to see anything more +in the way of distinction than exists between Englishmen and Danes, for +instance, or between Norwegians and Swedes. Indeed, it may be said that +much of the confusion and absurdity of classification found in +ethnographic literature may be traced to a tendency to see diversities +where few or none exist. To the observant man of travel who has given +the matter any attention, it seems that the most sensible classification +is that of the ancient writers who divide humanity into three races, +namely, white, yellow, and black. Cuvier adopted this division, and the +best contemporary British authority, Dr. Latham, also makes three +groups, although he varies somewhat in details from Cuvier. In +accordance with the nomenclature of Latham, the Eskimo may be spoken of +as Hyperborean Mongolidae of essentially carnivorous and ichthyophagous +habits, who have not yet emerged from the hunting and fishing stage. + + +PHYSICAL PECULIARITIES. + +Their physical appearance and structure having been already described by +others, it is unnecessary to mention them here, except incidentally and +by way of noting a few peculiarities that seem to have been heretofore +overlooked or slightly touched upon by other writers. Although as a rule +they are of short build, averaging about five feet seven inches, yet +occasional exceptions were met with among the natives of Kotzebue sound, +many of whom are tall and of commanding appearance. At Cape Kruzenstern +a man was seen who measured six feet six inches in height. This +divergence from the conventional Eskimo type, as usually described in +the books, may have been caused by inter-marriage with an inland tribe +of larger men from the interior of Alaska, who come to the coast every +summer for purposes of trade. + +The complexion, rarely a true white, but rather that of a Chinaman, with +a healthy blush suffusing each cheek, is often of a brownish-yellow and +sometimes quite black, as I have seen in several instances at Tapkan, +Siberia. Nor is the broad and flat face and small nose without +exception. In the vicinity of East cape, the easternmost extremity of +Asia, a few Eskimo were seen having distinctive Hebrew noses and a +physiognomy of such a Jewish type as to excite the attention and comment +of the sailors composing our crew; others were noticed having a Milesian +cast of features and looked like Irishmen, while others resembled +several old mulatto men I know in Washington. However, the Mongoloid +type in these people was so pronounced that our Japanese boys on meeting +Eskimo for the first time took them for Chinamen; on the other hand the +Japs were objects of great and constant curiosity to the Eskimo, who +doubtless took them for compatriots, a fact not to be wondered at, since +there is such a similarity in the shape of the eyes, the complexion, and +hair. In regard to the latter it may be remarked that scarcely anything +on board the _Corwin_ excited greater wonder and merriment among the +Eskimo than the presence of several persons whom Professor Huxley would +classify in his Xanthocroic group because of their fiery red hair. + +The structure and arrangement of the hair having lately been proposed as +a race characteristic upon which to base an ethnical classification, I +took pains to collect various specimens of Innuit hair, which, in +conjunction with Dr. Kidder, U.S.N., I examined microscopically and +compared with the hair of fair and blue-eyed persons, the hair of +negroes, and as a matter of curiosity with the reindeer hair and the +hair-like appendage found on the fringy extremity of the baleen plates +in the mouth of a "bowhead" whale. Some microphotographs of these +objects were made but with indifferent results. + +To the man willing and anxious to make more extended research into the +matter of race characteristics, I venture to say that a northern +experience will afford him ample opportunity for supplementing Mr. +Murray's paper on the Ethnological Classification of Vermin; and he may +further observe that the Eskimo, whatever may be his religious belief or +predilection, apparently observes the prohibitions of the Talmud in +regard both to filth and getting rid of noxious entomological specimens +that infest his body and habitation. + +Whatever modification the bodily structure of the Eskimo may have +undergone under the influence of physical and moral causes, when viewed +in the light of transcendental anatomy, we find that the mode, plan, or +model upon which his animal frame and organs are founded is +substantially that of other varieties of men. + +Some writers go so far, in speaking of the Eskimo's correspondence, +mental and physical, to his surroundings as to mention the seal as his +correlative, which, in my opinion, is about as sensible as speaking of +the reciprocal relations of a Cincinnati man and a hog. Unlike the seal, +which is preeminently an amphibian and a swimmer, the Eskimo has no +physical capability of the latter kind, being unable to swim and having +the greatest aversion to water except for purposes of navigation. He +wins our admiration from the expert management at sea of his little +shuttle-shaped canoe, which is a kind of marine bicycle, but I doubt +very much the somersaults he is reported to be able to turn in them. In +fact, after offering rewards of that all-powerful incentive, tobacco, on +numerous occasions, I have been unsuccessful in getting any one of them +to attempt the feat, and when told that we had heard of their doing it +they smiled rather incredulously. The Eskimo are clearly not successes +in a cubistic or saltatorial line, as I have had ample opportunities to +observe. They seem to be unable to do the simplest gymnastics, and were +filled with the greatest delight and astonishment at some exhibitions we +gave them on several occasions. Receiving a challenge to run a foot-race +with an Eskimo, I came off easy winner, although I was handicapped by +being out of condition at the time; a challenge to throw stones also +resulted in the same kind of victory; I shouldered and carried some logs +of driftwood that none of them could lift, and on another occasion the +captain and I demonstrated the physical superiority of the Anglo-Saxon +by throwing a walrus lance several lengths farther than any of the +Eskimo who had provoked the competition. As a rule they are deficient in +biceps, and have not the well-developed muscles of athletic white men. +The best muscular development I saw was among the natives of Saint +Lawrence island, who, by the way, showed me a spot in a village where +they practiced athletic sports, one of these diversions being lifting +and "putting" heavy stones, and I have frankly to acknowledge that a +young Eskimo got the better of me in a competition of this kind. It is +fair to assume that one reason for this physical superiority was the +inexorable law of the survival of the fittest, the natives in question +being the survivors of a recent prevailing epidemic and famine. + + +ESKIMO APPETITES. + +As far as my experience goes the Eskimo have not the enormous appetites +with which they are usually accredited. The Eskimo who accompanied +Lieutenant May, of the Nares Expedition, on his sledge journey, is +reported to have been a small eater, and the only case of scurvy, by the +way; several Eskimo who were employed on board the _Corwin_ as +dog-drivers and interpreters were as a rule smaller eaters than our own +men, and I have observed on numerous occasions among the Eskimo I have +visited, that instead of being great gluttons, they are, on the +contrary, moderate eaters. It is, perhaps, the revolting character of +their food--rancid oil, a tray of hot seal entrails, a bowl of +coagulated blood, for example--that causes overestimation of the +quantity eaten. Persons in whom nausea and disgust are awakened at +tripe, putrid game, or moldy and maggoty cheese affected by so-called +epicures, not to mention the bad oysters which George I. preferred to +fresh ones, would doubtless be prejudiced and incorrect observers as to +the quantity of food an Eskimo might consume. From some acquaintance +with the subject I therefore venture to say that the popular notion +regarding the great appetite of the Eskimo is one of the current +fallacies. The reported cases were probably exceptional ones, happening +in subjects who had been exercising and living on little else than +frozen air for perhaps a week. Any vigorous man in the prime of life who +has been shooting all day in the sharp, crisp air of the Arctic will be +surprised at his gastronomic capabilities; and personal knowledge of +some almost incredible instances amongst civilized men might be related, +were it not for fear of being accused of transcending the bounds of +veracity. + + +ORIGIN AND DEVELOPMENT. + +There is so much about certain parts of Alaska to remind one of Scotland +that we wonder why some of the more southern Eskimo have not the +intrepidity and vigor of Scotchmen, since they live under almost the +same topographical conditions amid fogs and misty hills. Perhaps if they +were fed on oatmeal, and could be made to adopt a few of the Scotch +manners and customs, religious and otherwise, they might, after infinite +ages of evolution, develop some of the qualities of that excellent race. +It is probably not so very many generations ago that our British +progenitors were like these original and primitive men as we find them +in the vicinity of Bering straits. Here the mind is taken back over +centuries, and one is able to study the link of transition between the +primitive men of the two continents at the spot where their geographical +relations lead us to suspect it. Indeed, the primitive man may be seen +just as he was thousands of years ago by visiting the village perched +like the eyry of some wild bird about 200 feet up the side of the cliff +at East cape, on the Asiatic side of the straits. This bold, rocky +cliff, rising sheer from the sea to the height of 2,100 feet, consists +of granite, with lava here and there, and the indications point to the +overflow of a vast ice sheet from the north, evidences of which are seen +in the trend of the ridges on the top, and the form of the narrow +peninsula joining the cliff to the mainland. From the summit of the cape +the Diomedes, Fairway Rock, and the American coast are so easily seen +that the view once taken would dispel any doubts as to the possibility +of the aboriginal denizens of America having crossed over from Asia, and +it would require no such statement to corroborate the opinion as that of +an officer of the Hudson Bay Company, then resident in Ungava bay, who +relates that in 1839 an Eskimo family crossed to Labrador from the +northern shore of Hudson's straits on a raft of driftwood. Natives cross +and recross Bering straits to-day on the ice and in primitive skin +canoes, not unlike Cape Cod dories, which have not been improved in +construction since the days of prehistoric man. Indeed, the primitive +man may be seen at East cape almost as he was thousands of years ago. +Evolution and development, with the exception of firearms, seem to have +halted at East cape. The place, with its cave-like dwellings and +skin-clad inhabitants, among whom the presence of white men creates the +same excitement as the advent of a circus among the colored population +of Washington, makes one fancy that he is in some grand prehistoric +museum, and that he has gone backward in time several thousand years in +order to get there. + +While we may do something towards tracing the effects of physical agents +on the Eskimo back into the darkness that antedates history, yet his +geographical origin and his antiquity are things concerning which we +know but little. Being subjects of first-class interest, deserving of +grave study and so vast in themselves, they cannot be touched upon here +except incidentally. Attempting to study them is like following the +labyrinthal ice mazes of the Arctic in quest of the North Pole. + +We may, however, venture the assertion that the Eskimo is of autocthonic +origin in Asia, but is not autocthonous in America. His arrival there +and subsequent migrations are beyond the reach of history or tradition. +Others, though, contend from the analogy of some of the western tribes +of Brazil, who are identical in feature to the Chinese, that the Eskimo +may have come from South America; and the fashion of wearing labrets, +which is common to the indigenous population both of Chili and Alaska, +has been cited as a further proof. + +Touching the subject of early migrations, Mr. Charles Wolcott Brooks, +whose sources of information at command have been exceptionally good, +reports in a paper to the California Academy of Sciences a record of +sixty Japanese junks which were blown off the coast and by the influence +of the Kuro-Shiwo were drifted or stranded on the coast of North +America, or on the Hawaiian or adjacent islands. As merchant ships and +ships of war are known to have been built in Japan prior to the +Christian era, a great number of disabled junks containing small parties +of Japanese must have been stranded on the Aleutian islands and on the +Alaskan coast in past centuries, thereby furnishing evidence of a +constant infusion of Japanese blood among the coast tribes. + +Leaving aside any attempt to show the ethnical relations of these facts, +the question naturally occurs whether any of these waifs ever found +their way back from the American coast. On observing the course of the +great circle of the Kuro-Shiwo and the course of the trade winds, one +inclines to the belief that such a thing is not beyond the range of +possibility. Indeed, several well-authenticated instances are mentioned +by Mr. Brooks; and in connection with the subject he advances a further +hypothesis, namely, the American origin of the Chinese race, and shows +in a plausible way that-- + + The ancestry of China may have embarked in large vessels as + emigrants, perhaps from the vicinity of the Chincha Islands, or + proceeded with a large fleet, like the early Chinese expedition + against Japan, or that of Julius Caesar against Britain, or the + Welsh Prince Madog and his party, who sailed from Ireland and + landed in America A.D. 1170; and, in like manner, in the dateless + antecedure of history, crossed from the neighborhood of Peru to the + country now known to us as China. + +If America be the oldest continent, paleontologically speaking, as +Agassiz tells us, there appears to be some reason for looking to it as +the spot where early traces of the race are to be found, and the fact +would seem to warrant further study and investigation in connection with +the indigenous people of our continent, thereby awakening new sources of +inquiry among ethnologists. + + +LINGUISTIC PECULIARITIES. + +The sienite plummet from San Joaquin Valley, California, goes back to +the distant age of the Drift; and the Calaveras skull, admitting its +authenticity, goes back to the Pliocene epoch, and is older than the +relics or stone implements from the drift gravel and the European caves. + +It is doubtful, though, whether these data enable us to make +generalizations equal in value to those afforded by the study of +vocabularies. It is alleged that linguistic affinities exist between +some of the tribes of the American coast and our Oriental neighbors +across the Pacific. Mr. Brooks, whom I have already quoted, reports that +in March, 1860, he took an Indian boy on board the Japanese steam +corvette _Kanrin-maru_, where a comparison of Coast-Indian and pure +Japanese was made at his request by Funkuzawa Ukitchy, then Admiral's +secretary; the result of which he prepared for the press and published +with a view to suggesting further linguistic investigations. He says +that quite an infusion of Japanese words is found among some of the +Coast tribes of Oregon and California, either pure or clipped, along +with some very peculiar Japanese "idioms, constructions, honorific, +separative, and agglutinative particles"; that shipwrecked Japanese are +invariably enabled to communicate understandingly with the Coast +Indians, although speaking quite a different language, and that many +shipwrecked Japanese have informed him that they were enabled to +communicate with and understand the natives of Atka and Adakh islands of +the Aleutian group. + +With a view to finding out whether any linguistic affinity existed +between Japanese and the Eskimo dialects in the vicinity of Bering +straits, I caused several Japanese boys, employed as servants on board +the _Corwin_, to talk on numerous occasions to the natives both of the +American and Asiatic coasts; but in every instance they were unable to +understand the Eskimo, and assured me that they could not detect a +single word that bore any resemblance to words in their own language. + +The study of the linguistic peculiarities which distinguish the +population around Bering straits offers an untrodden path in a new +field; but it is doubtful whether the results, except to linguists like +Cardinal Mezzofanti, or philologists of the Max Mueller type, would be at +all commensurate with the efforts expended in this direction, since it +is asserted that the human voice is incapable of articulating more than +twenty distinct sounds, therefore whatever resemblances there may be in +the particular words of different languages are of no ethnic value. +Although these may be the views of many persons not only in regard to +the Eskimo tongue but in regard to philology in general, the matter has +a wonderful fascination for more speculative minds. + +Much has been said about the affinity of language among the Eskimo--some +asserting that it is such as to allow mutual intercourse everywhere--but +instances warrant us in concluding that considerable deviations exist in +their vocabularies, if not in the grammatical construction. For +instance, take two words that one hears oftener than any others: On the +Alaska coast they say "na-koo-ruk," a word meaning "good," "all right," +etc.; on the Siberian coast "mah-zink-ah," while a vocabulary collected +during Lieutenant Schwatka's expedition gives the word "mah-muk'-poo" +for "good." The first two of these words are so characteristic of the +tribes on the respective shores above the straits that a better +designation than any yet given to them by writers on the subject would +be _Nakoorooks_ for the people on the American side and _Mazinkahs_ for +those on the Siberian coast. These names, by which they know each +other, are in general use among the whalemen and were adopted by every +one on board the _Corwin_. + +Again, on the American coast "Am-a-luk-tuk" signifies plenty, while on +the Siberian coast it is "Num-kuck-ee." "Tee-tee-tah" means needles in +Siberia, in Alaska it is "mitkin." In the latter place when asking for +tobacco they say "te-ba-muk," while the Asiatics say "salopa." That a +number of dialects exists around Bering straits is apparent to the most +superficial observer. The difference in the language becomes apparent +after leaving Norton sound. The interpreter we took from Saint Michael's +could only with difficulty understand the natives at Point Barrow, while +at Saint Lawrence island and on the Asiatic side he could understand +nothing at all. At East cape we saw natives who, though apparently +alike, did not understand each other's language. I saw the same thing at +Cape Prince of Wales, the western extremity of the New World, whither a +number of Eskimo from the Wankarem river, Siberia, had come to trade. +Doubtless there is a community of origin in the Eskimo tongue, and these +verbal divergencies may be owing to the want of written records to give +fixity to the language, since languages resemble living organisms by +being in a state of continual change. Be that as it may, we know that +this people has imported a number of words from coming in contact with +another language, just as the French have incorporated into their speech +"le steppeur," "l'outsider," "le high life," "le steeple chase," "le +jockey club," etc.--words that have no correlatives in French--so the +Eskimo has appropriated from the whalers words which, as verbal +expressions of his ideation, are undoubtedly better than anything in his +own tongue. One of these is "by and by," which he uses with the same +frequency that a Spaniard does his favorite _manana por la manano_. In +this instance the words express the state of development and habits of +thought--one the lazy improvidence of the Eskimo, and the other the +"to-morrow" of the Spaniard, who has indulged that propensity so far +that his nation has become one of yesterday. + +The change of the Eskimo language brought about by its coming in contact +with another forms an important element in its history, and has been +mentioned by the older writers, also by Gilder, who reports a change in +the language of the Iwillik Eskimo to have taken place since the advent +among them of the white men. Among other peculiarities of their +phraseology occurs the word "tanuk," signifying whiskey, and it is said +to have originated with an old Eskimo employed by Moore as a guide and +dog-driver when he wintered in Plover bay. Every day about noon that +personage was in the habit of taking his appetizer and usually said to +the Eskimo, "Come, Joe, let's take our tonic." Like most of his +countrymen, Joe was not slow to learn the meaning of the word, and to +this day the firm hold "tanuk" has on the language is only equalled by +the thirst for the fluid which the name implies. Among the Asiatic +Eskimo the word "um-muck" is common for "rum," while "em-mik" means +water. Even words brought by whalers from the South Sea islands have +obtained a footing, such as "kow-kow" for food, a word in general use, +and "pow" for "no," or "not any." They also call their babies +"pick-a-nee-nee," which to many persons will suggest the Spanish word or +the Southern negro idiom for "baby." The phrase "pick-a-nee-nee kowkow" +is the usual formula in begging food for their children. An Eskimo, +having sold us a reindeer, said it would be "mazinkah kow-kow" (good +eating), and one windy day we were hauling the seine, and an Eskimo +seeing its empty condition when pulled on to the beach, said, "'Pow' +fish; bimeby 'pow' wind, plenty fish." + +The fluency with which some of these fellows speak a mixture of pigeon +English and whaleman's jargon is quite astonishing, and suggests the +query whether their fluency results from the aggressiveness of the +English or is it an evidence of their aptitude? It seems wonderful how a +people we are accustomed to look upon as ignorant, benighted and +undeveloped, can learn to talk English with a certain degree of fluency +and intelligibility from the short intercourse held once a year with a +few passing ships. How many "hoodlums" in San Francisco, for instance, +learn anything of Norwegian or German from frequenting the wharves? How +many "wharf rats" or stevedores in New York learn anything of these +languages from similar intercourse? Or, for that matter, we may ask, How +many New York pilots have acquired even the smallest modicum of French +from boarding the steamers of the Compagnie Generale Transatlantique? + +From a few examples it will be seen that the usage followed by the +Eskimo in its grammatical variations rests on the fixity of the radical +syllable and upon the agglomeration of the different particles intended +to modify the primitive sense of this root, that is to say upon the +principle of agglutinative languages. One or two instances may suffice +to show the agglutinate character of the language. Canoe is "o-me-uk;" +ship "o-me-uk-puk;" steamer "o-me-uk-puk-ignelik;" and this composite +mechanical structure reaches its climax in steam-launch, which they +call "o-me-uk-puk-ignelik-pick-a-nee-nee." + +For snow and ice in their various forms there are also many words which +show further the polysynthetic structure of the language--a fact +contrary to that primitive condition of speech where there are no +inflections to indicate the relations of the words to each other. It +will not do to omit "O-kee-chuck" from this enumeration--a word +signifying trade, barter, or sale, and one most commonly heard among +these people. When they wish to say a thing is bad they use "A-shu-ruk," +and when disapproval is meant they say "pe-chuk." The latter word also +expresses general negation. For instance, on looking into several +unoccupied houses a native informs us "Innuit pechuk," meaning that the +people are away or not at home; "Allopar" is cold, and "allopar pechuk" +is hot. Persons fond of tracing resemblances may find in "Ignik" (fire) +a similarity to the Latin _ignis_ or the English "ignite," and from +"Un-gi doo-ruk" (big, huge) the transition down to "hunky-dory" is easy. +Those who see a sort of complemental relation to each other of +linguistic affinity and the conformity in physical characters may infer +from "Mikey-doo-rook" (a term of endearment equivalent to "Mavourneen" +and used in addressing little children) that the inhabitants within the +Polar Circle have something of the Emerald Isle about them. But no, they +are not Irish, for when they are about to leave the ship or any other +place for their houses they say "to hum"; consequently they are Yankees. + +I do not wish to be thought frivolous in my notions regarding the noble +science of philology; but when one considers the changes that language +is constantly undergoing, the inability of the human voice to articulate +more than twenty distinct sounds, and the wonderful amount of ingenious +learning that has been wasted by philologists on trifling subjects, one +is disposed to associate many of their deductions with the savage +picture-writing on Dighton Rock, the Cardiff Giant, and the old +wind-mill at Newport. + + +ESKIMO DIETETICS. + +Attempts to trace or discover the origin of races through supposed +philological analogies do not possess the advantage of certainty +afforded by the study of the means by which individuals of the race +supply the continuous demands of the body with the nutriment necessary +to maintain life and health. + +Everybody has heard of the seal, bear, walrus, and whale in connection +with Eskimo dietetics, and doubtless the stomachs of most persons would +revolt at the idea of eating these animals, the taste for which, by the +way, is merely a matter of early education or individual preference, for +there is no good reason why they should not be just as palatable to the +northern appetite as pig, sheep, and beef are to the inhabitants of +temperate latitudes. As food they renew the nitrogenous tissues, +reconstruct the parts and restore the functions of the Eskimo frame, +prolong his existence, and produce the same animal contentment and joy +as the more civilized viands of the white man's table. There are more +palatable things than bear or eider duck, yet I know many persons to +whom snails, olive oil, and _pate de fois gras_ are more repugnant. A +tray full of hot seal entrails, a bowl of coagulated blood, and putrid +fish are not very inviting or lickerish to ordinary mortals, yet they +have their analogue in the dish of some farmers who eat a preparation of +pig's bowels known as "chitterlings," and in the blood-puddings and +Limburger cheese of the Germans. Blubber-oil and whale are not very +dainty dishes, yet consider how many families subsist on half-baked +saleratus biscuits, salted pork, and oleomargarine. + +On the mess table of the Fur Company's establishment at St. Paul island, +seal meat is a daily article of consumption, and from personal +experience I can testify as to its palatability, although it reminded +one of indifferent beef rather overdone. Hair seal and bear steaks were +on different occasions tried at the mess on board the Corwin, but +everybody voted eider duck and reindeer the preference. It is not so +very long since that whale was a favorite article of diet in England and +Holland, and Arctic whalemen still, to my personal knowledge, use the +freshly tried oil in cooking; for instance in frying cakes, for which +they say it answers the purpose as well as the finest lard, while others +breakfast on whale and potatoes prepared after the manner of codfish +balls. The whale I have tasted is rather insipid eating, yet it appears +to be highly nutritious, judging from the well-nourished look of natives +who have lived on it, and the air of greasy abundance and happy +contentment that pervades an Eskimo village just after the capture of a +whale. Being ashore one day with our pilot, we met a native woman whom +he recognized as a former acquaintance, and on remarking to her that she +had picked up in flesh since he last saw her, she replied that she had +been living on a whale all the Winter, which explained her plumpness. + +It must not be supposed, however, that the whale, seal and walrus +constitute the entire food supply of the Arctic. There is scarcely any +more toothsome delicacy than reindeer, the tongue of which is very +dainty and succulent. There is one peculiarity about its flesh--in +order to have it in perfection it must be eaten very soon after being +killed; the sooner the better, for it deteriorates in flavor the longer +it is kept. Indeed, the Eskimo do not wait for the animal heat to leave +the carcass, as they eat the brains and paunch hot and smoking. + +While our gastronomic enthusiasm did not extend this far, we dined +occasionally on fresh trout from a Siberian mountain lake, young wild +ducks as fat as squabs, and reindeer, any of which delicacies could not +be had in the same perfection at Delmonico's or any similar +establishment in New York for love or money. There is scarcely any +better eating in the way of fish than _coregonus_--a new species +discovered at Point Barrow by the _Corwin_--and certainly no more dainty +game exists than the young wild geese and ptarmigan to be found in +countless numbers in Hotham inlet. At the latter place, doubtless the +warmest inside the straits, are found quantities of cranberries about +the size of a pea, which not only make a delicious accessory to roasted +goose, but act as a valuable antiscorbutic. These berries and a kind of +kelp, which I have seen Eskimo eating at Tapkan, Siberia, seem to be the +only vegetable food they have. The large quantities of eggs easily +procurable, but in most cases doubtful, also constitute a standard +article of diet among these people, who have no scruples about eating +them partly hatched. They seemed never to comprehend our fastidiousness +in the matter and why our tastes differed so much from theirs in this +respect. They will break an egg containing an embryonic duck or goose, +extract the bird by one leg and devour it with all the relish of an +epicure. Gull's eggs, however, are in disrepute among them, for the +women--who, by the way, have the same frailties and weaknesses as their +more civilized sisters--believe that eating gull's eggs causes loss of +beauty and brings on early decrepitude. The men, on the other hand, are +fond of seal eyes, a tid-bit which the women believe increases their +amorousness, and feed to their lords after the manner of "Open your +mouth and shut your eyes." + +Game is, as a rule, very tame, and during the moulting season, when the +geese are unable to fly, it is quite possible to kill them with a stick. +At one place, Cape Thompson, Eskimo were seen catching birds from a high +cliff with a kind of scoop-net, and I saw birds at Herald island refuse +to move when pelted with stones, so unaccustomed were they to the +presence of man. In addition to being very tame, game is plentiful, and +it is not uncommon, off the Siberian coast, to see flocks of eider ducks +darkening the air and occupying several hours in passing overhead. It +was novel sport to see the natives throw a projectile known as an +"apluketat" into one of these flocks with astonishing range and +accuracy, bringing down the game with the effectiveness of a shotgun. + +Game keeps so well in the Arctic that an instance is known of its being +perfectly sweet and sound on an English ship after two years' keeping, +and whalemen kill a number of pigs, which they hang in the rigging and +keep for use during the cruise. It is also noticeable that leather +articles do not mildew as they generally do at sea, some shoes kept in a +locker on board the _Corwin_ having retained their polish during the +entire cruise. + +The food of the Eskimo satisfies their instinctive craving for a +hydrocarbon, but they do not allow themselves to be much disturbed or +distracted in its preparation, as most of it is eaten raw. They +occasionally boil their food, however, and some of them have learned the +use of flour and molasses, of which they are very fond. + +Their aversion to salt is a very marked peculiarity, and they will not +eat either corned beef or pork on this account. It may be that +physiological reasons exist for this dislike. + + +SOCIAL AND DOMESTIC RELATIONS. + +Omitting other ethnographic facts relative to the Eskimo, which might be +treated in a systematic way except for their triteness, we pass from the +means of the renewal of the animal economy to its reproduction. +Courtship and marriage, which, it is said, are conducted in the most +unsentimental manner possible, are for that reason not to be discussed; +and for obvious reasons many of the prenatal conditions cannot here be +dwelt upon. Having never witnessed the act of parturition in an Eskimo +my knowledge of the subject is merely second-hand, and consequently not +worth detailing. It appears, though, that parturition is a function +easily performed among them, and that it is unattended by the +post-partum accidents common to civilization. As a rule the women are +unprolific, it being uncommon to find a family numbering over three +children, and the mortality among the new-born is excessive, owing to +the ignorance and neglect of the ordinary rules of hygiene. They seem, +however, to be kind to their children, who in respect to crying do not +show the same peevishness as seen in our nurseries; indeed, the social +and demonstrative good nature of the race seems to crop out even in +babyhood, as I have often witnessed under such circumstances as a baby +enveloped in furs in a skin canoe which lay along side the ship during a +snowstorm; its tiny hands protruding held a piece of blubber, which it +sucked with apparent relish, the unique picture of happy contentment. It +was quick to feel itself an object of attraction, and its chubby face +returned any number of smiles of recognition. + +The manner of carrying the infant is contrary to that of civilized +custom. It is borne on the back under the clothes of the mother, which +form a pouch, and from which its tiny head is generally visible over one +or the other shoulder, but on being observed by strangers it shrinks +like a snail or a marsupian into its snug retreat. When the mother wants +to remove it she bends forward, at the same time passing her left hand +up the back under her garments, and seizing the child by the feet, pulls +it downward to the left; then, passing the right hand under the front of +the dress, she again seizes the feet and extracts it by a kind of +podalic delivery. Another common way of carrying children is astride the +neck. The subject is one that the Chucki artist often carves in ivory. + +The play impulse manifests itself among these people in various ways. +They have such mimetic objects as dolls, miniature boats, etc. I have +seen a group of boys, sailing toy boats in a pond, behave under the +circumstances just as a similar group has been observed to do at +Provincetown, Cape Cod, and the same act, as performed in the Frog Pond +of the Boston Common, may be called only a differentiated form of the +same tendency. Their dolls, of ivory and clothed with fur, seem to +answer the same purpose that they do in civilized communities--namely, +the amusement of little girls--for at one place where we landed a number +of Eskimo girls, stopping play on our approach, sat their dolls up in a +row, evidently with a view to giving the dolls a better look at the +strange visitors. Spinning tops, essentially Eskimo and unique in their +character, are held in the hand while spinning; on the Siberian coast +football is played, and among other questionable things acquired from +contact with the whalemen, a knowledge of card-playing exists. We were +very often asked for cards, and at one place where we stopped and +bartered a number of small articles with the natives they gave evidence +of their aptitude at gaming. The game being started, with the bartered +articles as stakes, one fellow soon scooped in everything, leaving the +others to go off dead-broke, amid the ridicule of some of our crew, and +doubtless feeling worse than dead, for among no people that I have seen, +not even the French, does ridicule so effectually kill. + + +PERSONAL ORNAMENTATION. + +Among the means taken by these people to produce personal ornamentation +that of tattooing the face and wearing a labret is the most noticeable. +The custom of tattooing having existed from the earliest historical +epochs is important, not only from an ethnological but from a medical +and pathological point of view, and even in its relation to medical +jurisprudence in cases of contested personal identity. + +Without going into the history of the subject, it may not be irrelevant +to mention that tattooing was condemned by the Fathers of the Church, +Tertullian, among others, who gives the following rather singular reason +for interdicting its use among women: "Certi sumus Spiritum Sanctum +magis masculis tale aliquid subscribere potuisse si feminis +subscripsisset."[2] + +In addition to much that has been written by French and German writers, +the matter of tattoo-marks has of late claimed the attention of the law +courts of England, the Chief-Justice, Cockburn, in the Tichbourne case, +having described this species of evidence as of "vital importance," and +in itself final and conclusive. The absence of the tattoo-marks in this +case justified the jury in their finding that the defendant was not and +could not be Roger Tichbourne, whereupon the alleged claimant was proved +to be an impostor, found guilty of perjury, and sentenced to penal +servitude.[3] + +[Illustration: Style of personal ornamentation adopted by the women of +Saint Lawrence island.] + +Why the ancient habit of tattooing should prevail so extensively among +some of the primitive tribes as it does, for instance, in the Polynesian +islands and some parts of Japan, and we may say as a survival of a +superstitious practice of paganism among sailors and others, is a +psychological problem difficult to solve. Whether it be owing to +perversion of the sexual instinct, which is not unlikely, or to other +cause, it is not proposed to discuss. Be that as it may, the prevalence +of the habit among the Eskimo is confined to the female sex, who are +tattooed on arriving at the age of puberty. The women of Saint Lawrence +island, in addition to lines on the nose, forehead and chin, have +uniformly a figure of strange design on the cheeks, which is suggestive +of cabalistic import. It could not be ascertained, however, whether such +is the case. The lines drawn on the chin were exactly like the ones I +have seen on Moorish women in Morocco. Another outlandish attempt at +adornment was witnessed at Cape Blossom in a woman who wore a bunch of +colored beads suspended from the septum of her nose. These habits, +however, hardly seem so revolting as the use of the labret by the +"Mazinka" men on the American coast, of whom it is related that a sailor +seeing one of them for the first time, and observing the slit in the +lower lip through which the native thrust his tongue, thought he had +discovered a man with two mouths. The use of the labret, like many of +the attempts at primitive ornamentation, is very old, its use having +been traced by Dall along the American coast from the lower part of +Chili to Alaska. Persons fond of tracing, vestiges of savage +ornamentation amid intellectual advancement and aesthetic sensibility far +in advance of the primitive man, may observe in the wearers of bangles +and earrings the same tendency existing in a differentiated form. + + +DIVERSIONS. + +I doubt whether Shakespeare's dictum in regard to music holds good when +applied to the Eskimo, for they have but little music in their souls, +and among no people is there such a noticeable absence of "treason, +stratagem and spoil." A rude drum and a monotonous chant, consisting +only of the fundamental note and minor third, are the only things in the +way of music among the more remote settlements of which I have any +knowledge. Mrs. Micawber's singing has been described as the table-beer +of acoustics. Eskimo singing is something more. The beer has become flat +by the addition of ice. One of our engineers, who is quite a fiddler, +experimented on his instrument with a view to seeing what effect music +would have on the "savage breast," but his best efforts at rendering +"Madame Angot" and the "Grande Duchesse" were wasted before an +unsympathetic audience, who showed as little appreciation of his +performance as some people do when listening to Wagner's "Music of the +Future." + +Where they have come in contact with civilization their musical taste is +more developed. At Saint Michael's I was told that some of their songs +are so characteristic that it is much to be regretted that some of them +cannot be bottled up in a phonograph and sent to a musical composer. On +the coast of Siberia I heard an Eskimo boy sing correctly a song he had +learned while on board a whaling vessel, and on several of the Aleutian +islands the natives play the accordeon quite well; have music-boxes, and +even whistle strains from "Pinafore." + +From music to dancing the transition is obvious, no matter whether the +latter be regarded in a Darwinian sense as a device to attract the +opposite sex or as the expression of joyous excitement. This +manifestation of feeling in its bodily discharge, which Moses and Miriam +and David indulged in, which is ranked with poetry by Aristotle, and +which old Homer says is the sweetest and most perfect of human +enjoyments, is a pastime much in vogue among the Eskimo, and it required +but little provocation to start a dance at any time on the _Corwin's_ +decks when a party happened to be on board. The dancing, however, had +not the cadence of "a wave of the sea," nor was there the harmony of +double rotation circling in a series of graceful curves to strains like +those of Strauss or Gungl. On the contrary, there was something +saltatorial and jerky about all the dancing I saw both among the men and +women. It is the custom at some of their gatherings, after the hunting +season is over, for the men to indulge in a kind of terpsichorean +performance, at the same time relating in Homeric style the heroic deeds +they have done. At other times the women do all the dancing. Being +stripped to the waist they are more _decollete_ than our beauties at the +German, and the men take the part of spectators only in this +choreographical performance. + + +ART INSTINCT. + +The aptitude shown by Eskimo in carving and drawing has been noticed by +all travellers among them. Some I have met with show a degree of +intelligence and appreciation in regard to charts and pictures scarcely +to be expected from such a source. From walrus ivory they sculpture +figures of birds, quadrupeds, marine animals, and even the human form, +which display considerable individuality notwithstanding their crude +delineation and imperfect detail. I have also seen a fair carving of a +whale in plumbago. Evidences of decoration are sometimes seen on their +canoes, on which are found rude pictures of walruses, etc., and they +have a kind of picture-writing, by means of which they commemorate +certain events in their lives, just as Sitting Bull has done in an +autobiography that may be seen at the Army Medical Museum. + +When we were searching for the missing whalers off the Siberian coast, +some natives were come across with whom we were unable to communicate +except by signs, and wishing to let them know the object of our visit, a +ship was drawn in a note-book and shown to them, with accompanying +gesticulations, which they quickly comprehended, and one fellow, taking +the pencil and note-book, drew correctly a pair of reindeer horns on the +ship's jib-boom--a fact which identified, beyond doubt, the derelict +vessel they had seen. At Point Hope an Eskimo, who had allowed us to +take sketches of him, desired to sketch one of the party, and taking one +of our note-books and a pencil, neither of which he ever had in his hand +before, produced the accompanying likeness of Professor Muir: + +[Illustration] + +At Saint Michael's there is an Eskimo boy who draws remarkably well, +having taught himself by copying from the _Illustrated London News_. He +made a correct pen-and-ink drawing of the _Corwin_, and another of the +group of buildings at Saint Michael's, which, though creditable in many +respects, had the defect of many Chinese pictures, being faulty in +perspective. As these drawings equal those in Dr. Rink's book, done by +Greenland artists, I regret my inability to reproduce them here. As +evidences of culture they show more advancement than the carvings of +English rustics that a clergyman has caused to be placed on exhibition +at the Kensington Museum. + +Sir John Ross speaks highly of his interpreter as an artist; Beechy says +that the knowledge of the coast obtained by him from Innuit maps was of +the greatest value, while Hall and others show their geographical +knowledge to be as perfect as that possible of attainment by civilized +men unaided by instruments. I had frequent opportunities to observe +these Eskimo ideas of chartography. They not only understood reading a +chart of the coast when showed to them, but would make tracings of the +unexplored part, as I knew a native to do in the case of an Alaskan +river, the mouth only of which was laid down on our chart. + +Manifestation of the plastic art, which is found among tribes less +intelligent, is rare among the Eskimo. In fact, the only thing of the +kind seen was some rude pottery at Saint Lawrence island, the design of +which showed but crude development of ornamental ideas. The same state +of advancement was shown in some drinking cups carved from mammoth ivory +and a dipper made from the horn of a mountain sheep. + + +COMBATIVENESS. + +In one of the acts of Shakespeare's "Seven Ages" the Eskimo plays a very +unimportant _role_. Perhaps in no other race is the combative instinct +less predominant; in none is quarrelling, fierceness of disposition, and +jealousy more conspicuously absent, and in none does the desire for the +factitious renown of war exist in a more rudimentary and undeveloped +state. Perhaps the constant fight with cold and hunger is a compensation +which must account for the absence of such unmitigated evils as war, +taxes, complex social organization and hierarchy among the curious +people of the icy north. The pursuits of peace and of simple patriarchal +lives, notwithstanding the fact of much in connection therewith that is +wretched, and forbidding to a civilized man, seem to beget in these +people a degree of domestic tranquility and contentment which, united to +their light-hearted and cheery disposition, is an additional reason for +believing the sum of human happiness to be constant throughout the +world. + + +MENTAL CHARACTER AND CAPACITY. + +The intellectual character of the Eskimo, judging from the information +which various travellers have furnished, as well as my personal +knowledge, produces more than a feeble belief in the possibility of +their being equal to anything they choose to take an interest in +learning. The Eskimo is not "muffled imbecility," as some one has called +him, nor is he dull and slow of understanding, as Vitruvius describes +the northern nation to be "from breathing a thick air"--which, by the +way, is thin, elastic and highly ozonized--nor is he, according to Dr. +Beke, "degenerated almost to the lowest state compatible with the +retention of rational endowments." On the contrary, the old Greenland +missionary, Hans Egede, writes: "I have found some of them witty enough +and of good capacity;" Sir Martin Frobisher says they are "in nature +very subtle and sharp-witted;" Sir Edward Parry, while extolling their +honesty and good nature, adds, "Indeed, it required no long acquaintance +to convince us that art and education might easily have made them equal +or superior to ourselves;" Sauer tells of a woman who learned to speak +Russian fluently in rather less than twelve months, and Beechy and +others have acknowledged the intelligent help they have received from +Eskimo in making their explorations. + +Before going further, it may not be amiss to speak in a general way of +the bony covering which protects the organ whose function it is to +generate the vibrations known as thought. Of one hundred crania, +collected principally at Saint Lawrence island, a number were examined +by me at the Army Medical Museum, through the courtesy of Dr. +Huntington, with the result of changing and greatly modifying some of +the previous notions of the conventional Eskimo skull as acquired from +books on craniology. Perhaps after the inspection and examination of a +large collection of crania, it may be safe to pronounce upon their +differential character; but whether the differences in configuration are +constant or only occasional manifestations, admits of as much doubt as +the exceptions in Professor Sophocles's Greek grammar, which are often +coextensive with the rule.[4] + +The typical Eskimo skull, according to popular notion, is one exhibiting +a low order of intelligence, and characterized by small brain capacity, +with great prominence of the superciliary ridges, occipital +protuberance and zygomatic arches, the latter projecting beyond the +general contour of the skull like the handles of a jar or a peach +basket; and lines drawn from the most projecting part of the arches and +touching the sides of the frontal bone are supposed to meet over the +forehead, forming a triangle, for which reason the skull is known as +pyramidal. + +The first specimen, examined from a vertical view, shows something of +the typical character as figured in A, and when viewed posteriorly there +is noticed a flattening of the parietal walls with an elongated vertex +as shown in D; while a second specimen, represented by B, shows none of +the foregoing characteristics, the form being elongated and the parietal +walls so far overhanging as to conceal the zygomatic arches in the +vertical view, so that if lines be drawn as previously mentioned, +instead of forming a triangle they may, like the asymptotes of a +parabola, be extended to infinity and never meet. + +For purposes of comparison a number of orthographic outlines, showing +the contour of civilized crania, from a vertical point of observation, +are herewith annexed. No. 1 is that of an eminent mathematician who +committed suicide; No. 2, a prominent politician during the civil war; +No. 3, a banker; and No. 4, a notorious assassin. Nos. 5 and 6 are negro +skulls. Further comparison may be made with the Jewish skull, as +represented in No. 7, in which the nasal bones project so far beyond the +general contour as to form a bird-like appendage. + +[Illustration: A] + +[Illustration: B] + +[Illustration: C] + +[Illustration: D] + +A collection of Aleutian heads, as seen from a vertical point of +observation, when I looked down from the gallery of the little Greek +church at Ounalaska, presented at first certain collective characters +by which they approach one another. But anatomists know that a careful +comparison of any collection will show extremely salient differences. In +fact, individual differences, so numerous and so irregular as to prevent +methodical enumeration, constitute the stumbling-block of ethnic +craniology. Take, for instance, a number of the skulls under +consideration: in proportions they will be found to present very +considerable variations among themselves. The skulls figured by A and B +are respectively brachycephalic and dolichocephalic. The former has an +internal capacity of 1,400, the latter 1,214 cubic centimeters; but the +facial angle of each is 80 deg., and in one Eskimo cranium it runs up to +84 deg.. If the facial angle be trustworthy, as a measure of the degree of +intelligence, we have shown here a development far in excess of the +negro, which is placed at 70 deg., or of the Mongolian at 75 deg., and exceeding +that observed by me in many German skulls, which do not, as a rule, come +up to the 90 deg. of Jupiter Tonans or of Cuvier, in spite of the boasted +intelligence of that nationality. + +[Illustration: _No. 1._] + +[Illustration: _No. 2._] + +[Illustration: _No. 3._] + +[Illustration: _No. 4._] + +[Illustration: _No. 5._] + +[Illustration: _No. 6._] + +In none of the skulls of the collection is there observable the heavy +superciliary ridges alleged to be common in lower races, but which exist +in many of the best-formed European crania--shall we say as anomalies +or as individual variations? Nor is the convexity of the squamo-parietal +suture such as characterizes the low-typed cranium of the chimpanzee or +the Mound Builder. On the contrary, the orbits are cleanly made and the +suture is well curved. Besides, a low degree of intelligence is not +shown by observing the index of the foramen magnum, which is about the +same as that found in European crania; and the same may be said of the +internal capacity of the cranium. To illustrate the latter remark is +appended a tabular statement made up from Welcker, Broca, Aitken and +Meigs: + + Cubic centimeters. + +Australian 1,228 +Polynesian 1,230 +Hottentot 1,230 +Mexican 1,296 +Malay 1,328 +Ancient Peruvian 1,361 +French 1,403 to 1,461 +German 1,448 +English 1,572 + +An average of the Eskimo skull, some of which measure as much as 1,650 +and 1,715 c.c., will show the brain capacity to be the same as that of +the French or of the Germans. None of them, however, approaches the +anomalous capacities of two Indian skulls on exhibition at the Army +Medical Museum, one of which shows 1,785 c.c., and the other the +unprecedented measurement of 1,920 c.c. + +If the foregoing means for estimating the mental grasp and capacity for +improvement be correct, then we must accord to the most northern nation +of the globe a fair degree of brain energy--potential though it be. +Aside from the mere physical methods of determining the degree of +intelligence, it is urged by some writers, among them the historian +Robertson, that tact in commerce and correct ideas of property are +evidence of a considerable progress toward civilization. The natural +inference from this is that they are tests of intellectual power, since +mind is a combination of all the actual and possible states of +consciousness of the organism, and an examination of the Eskimo system +of trade draws its own conclusion. Their fondness for trade has been +known for a long time, as well as the extended range of their commercial +intercourse. They trade with the Indians, with the fur companies, the +whalers and among themselves across Bering straits. Many of them are +veritable Shylocks, having a through comprehension of the axiom in +political economy regarding the regulation of the price of a thing by +the demand. + +[Illustration: _No. 7._] + + +THE MORAL SENSE AND THE RELIGIOUS INSTINCT. + +With the aptitudes and instincts of our common humanity Eskimo morals, +as manifested in truth, right and virtue, also admit of remark. Except +where these people have had the bad example of the white man, whose +vices they have imitated, not on account of defective moral nature, but +because they saw few or no virtues, they are models of truthfulness and +honesty. In fact their virtues in this respect are something phenomenal. +The same cannot be said, however, for their sexual morals, which, as a +rule, are the contrary of good. Even a short stay among the hyperboreans +causes one to smile at Lord Kames's "frigidity of the North Americans," +and at the fallacy of Herder who says, "the blood of man near the pole +circulates but slowly, the heart beats but languidly; consequently the +married live chastely, the women almost require compulsion to take upon +them the troubles of a married life," etc. Nearly the same idea +expressed by Montesquieu, and repeated by Byron in "happy the nations of +the moral North," are statements so at variance with our experience that +this fact must alone excuse a reference to the subject. So far are they +from applying to the people in question that it is only necessary to +mention, without going into detail, that the women are freely offered to +strangers by way of hospitality, showing a decided preference for white +men, whom they believe to beget better offspring than their own men. In +this regard one is soon convinced that salacious and prurient tastes are +not the exclusive privilege of people living outside of the Arctic +Circle; and observation favors the belief in the existence of pederasty +among Eskimo, if one may be allowed to judge from circumstances, which +it is not necessary to particularize, and from a word in their language +signifying the act. + +Since morality is the last virtue acquired by man and the first one he +is likely to lose, it is not so surprising to find outrages on morals +among the undeveloped inhabitants of the north as it is to find them in +intelligent Christian communities among people whose moral sense ought +to be far above that of the average primitive man in view of their +associations and the variations that have been so frequently repeated +and accumulated by heredity; and where there is no hierarchy nor +established missionaries it is still more surprising to find any moral +sense at all among a people whose vague religious belief does not extend +beyond Shamanism or Animism, which to them explains the more strange and +striking natural phenomena by the hypothesis of direct spiritual agency. + +It must not be understood by this, however, that these people have no +religion, as many travellers have erroneously believed; that would be +almost equivalent to stating that races of men exist without speech, +memory or knowledge of fire. A purely ethnological view of religion +which regards it as "the feeling which falls upon man in the presence of +the unknown," favors the idea that the children of the icy north have +many of the same feelings in this respect as those experienced by +ourselves under similar conditions, although there is doubtless a change +in us produced by more advanced thought and nicer feeling. On the other +hand, how many habits and ideas that are senseless and perfectly +unexplainable by the light of our present modes of life and thought can +be explained by similar customs and prejudices existing among these +distant tribes. Is there no fragment of primitive superstition or +residue of bygone ages in the supposed influence of the "Evil Eye" in +Ireland, or in the habit of "telling the bees" in Germany? Is there not +something of intellectual fossildom in the popular notion about Friday +and thirteen at table, and in the ancient rite of exorcising oppressed +persons, houses and other places supposed to be haunted by unwelcome +spirits, the form of which is still retained in the Roman ritual? And is +not our enlightened America "the land of spiritualists, mesmerism, +soothsaying and mystical congregations"? + +When the native of Saint Michael's invokes the moon, or the native of +Point Barrow his crude images previously to hunting the seal, in order +to bring good luck, is not the mental and emotional impulse the same as +that which actuates more civilized men to look upon "outward signs of an +inward and spiritual grace," or not to start upon any important +undertaking without first invoking the blessing of Deity? And are not +the rites observed by the natives on the Siberian coast, when the first +walrus is caught, the counterpart of our Puritan Thanksgiving Day? + +Perhaps the untutored Eskimo has the same fear of the dangerous and +terrible, the unknown, the infinite, as ourselves, and parts with life +just as reluctantly: but it cannot be said that our observation favors +the fact of his longevity, although long life seems to prevail among +some of the circumpolar tribes, the Laps, for instance, who, according +to Scheffer, in spite of hard lives enjoy good health, are long-lived, +and still alert at eighty and ninety years.--(De Medecina Laponum.) + +Owing to his hard life, the conflict with his circumstances and his want +of foresight, the Eskimo soon becomes a physiological bankrupt, and his +stock of vitality being exhausted, his bodily remains are covered with +stones, around which are placed wooden masks and articles that have +been useful to him during life, as I have seen at Nounivak island, or +they are covered with driftwood as observed in Kotzebue sound, or as at +Tapkan, Siberia, where the corpse is lashed to a long pole and is taken +some distance from the village, when the clothes are stripped off, +placed on the ground and covered with stones. The cadaver is then +exposed in the open air to the tender mercies of crows, foxes and +wolves. The weapons and other personal effects of the decedent are +placed near by, probably with something of the same sentiment that +causes us to use chaplets of flowers and immortelles as funeral +offerings--a custom that Schiller has commemorated in "Bringet hier die +letzen Gaben." + +The future destiny of these people is a question in which the theologian +and politician are not less interested than the man of science. Some +observers seem to think that their numbers are diminishing under the +evil influence of so-called civilization. But as every race participates +in the same moral nature, and the entire history of humanity, according +to Herder, is a series of events pointing to a higher destiny than has +yet been revealed, there is no reason why the sum of human happiness, +under proper auspices, should not be increased among the Innuit race. +Arch-deacon Kirkby, a Church of England clergyman who has lately visited +them in a missionary capacity as far as Boothia, speaks in the highest +terms of their intelligence and capacity for improvement. Here, then, is +a brilliant opportunity for some one full of propagandism and charity to +repeat the acts of the modern apostles and extend the influence of +civilization to the gay, lively, curious and talkative hyperboreans +whose home is under the midnight sun and on the borders of the Icy Sea. + +[Illustration: WRANGEL ISLAND. + +Journal, American Geographical Society, Vol. XV, 1883. + +Bulletin N^o. 3. Rosse.] + +FOOTNOTES: + +[Footnote 1: In November, 1882, while in London, I met Mr. Gilder, the +_Herald_ correspondent, who accompanied the U.S. ship _Rodgers_, and he +showed me this record and paper which he had taken from the cairn during +a subsequent visit to the island.] + +[Footnote 2: De Virginibus velandis. Lutetiae Parisiorum. 1675 f^o., p. +178.] + +[Footnote 3: See Guy's Hospital Report, XIX, 1874; also "Histoire +Medicale du Tatouage," in Archives de Medecine Navale, Tom. 11 and 12, +Paris, 1869.] + +[Footnote 4: Retzius, Finska Kranier, Stockholm: 1878.] + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The First Landing on Wrangel Island, by +Irving C. 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