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.