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rather, do not eat it like the St. Lawrence Islanders.
Several young women came to us in these baidars. Some of them were very pretty despite the fact that they disfigure their faces with tattooing. Two narrow lines go from the hair across the forehead, nose, and end under the chin. Other lines are tattooed in a semicircle on the cheeks. Men have no decorations at all. They cut their hair on the top, leaving round the head a crown of hair about a vershok [about 1 3/4 inches] in length, but the women let their hair grow, and twist it into braids, falling, not in the back, but on both sides so that their ears are not to be seen. The clothing of the Chukchi, men as well as women, consists of double deer parkas, of sealskin trousers for men, and deer trousers for the women. Their boots, also from seal, are identical for both sexes.
These people are middle sized, but wide shouldered and strong. Originally the color of their skin, as is noticeable in children, is white, but from the constant smoking in the yurts, it becomes dark yellow, or better, dirty. From this, and also because the snow almost never melts here entirely, everybody's eyes are red and swollen, but we did not see any blind ones. The lack of cleanliness borders on the indredible. They never wash, and have such a repulsive habits that they cannot be described. Their weapons consist of wooden bows, arrows, and spears with bone tips into which are inserted flint points. Besides that, each one has two knives, a smaller one at the waist and a large one on the back between
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the shoulder blades. Near some we saw rifles. Their sleds are wooden, low, long, some with covers, and instead of shoes, their runners are covered with bone or whalebone. For transportation the nomadic Chukchi use deer, the sedentary ones, dogs.
Concerning their religion, I could learn only that they believe in a benevolent being called Kergeugia. To him they ascribe all the good and the joyful in the world, but never give him any offerings. They also believe in a malevolent creature called Kamaka. To this one they often bring offerings to propitiate him, so that he will not send them misfortune. Their offerings are very simple. Three whale ribs are stuck vertically into the earth behind every yurt. They never forget, when passing it, to stick to it some moist tobacco, or if they eat something, a piece of food taken from their mouth, calling on Kamaka to accept the offering. They believe in life after death and say that the good ones, after death, stay with Kergeugia where they have no scarcity of anything. Kamaka takes the wicked ones and torments them with all possible tortures. They think that the world will destroy itself, and that from the ruins will emerge another land.
About the creation of man, they have the following conception. From far away a whale swam forth and gave birth to a man who wandered in loneliness until Kergeugia, taking pity on him, threw a woman from heaven. But how, when, and by whom the world was created, they do not know.
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These are the beliefs of the littoral or sedentary Chukchi. Whether the nomadic ones have the same beliefs is not known to me.
At dawn on the 11th we weighed anchor with a light NE wind, but had as yet not passed the sandspit from which a shoal extends rather far, when it became calm and the current carried us to the shoal. The sloop was grounded. To get off, as soon as we were ready to reel in the stream-anchor, a light breeze began to blow from the NE. We immediately braced the yards. The wind hit it from the front, and the sloop soon sailed backwards from the shoal without any further trouble. But here again the wind died down, and to avoid the repetition of the same event we were forced to drop anchor in the middle of the bay. Soon after that we saw a large baidar coming toward us from the back of the bay. Among the arriving Chukchi was a chief by the name of Paigdau and a baptized native. This one promised to bring us a few deer the next day without fail. Receiving presents, he returned to shore, but Chief Paigdau liked our life so much that he remained on the sloop. Fresh food was almost indispensable for the crew because scurvy started to appear again, and the captain decided to wait until the next day. But instead of one [day], the calms detained us here for another three days. In vain we waited for the return of Ivan (as we called the baptized Chukchi), and for this reason on the second day, on the advice of Paigdau, a skiff was sent ashore, but it returned empty, not having
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found a single person in the indicated settlement. Paigdau remained with us during all the rest of our stay in St. Lawrence Bay, which the Chukchi call "kugom-puniani," and left on an arriving baidar when we were under sail.
This chief told us that he annually goes to the fair at Ostrovnoe [the Anyui market] and that this year he saw there many Russian toions who came from Nizhne Kolymsk. Upon our inquiries about the position of the Asiatic shore, he declared that we would not get far to the north, and when we told him that we intended to get through to Nizhne Kolymsk, he laughed, saying, "Much ice, mountains of ice, you will not be able to get through."
When we got under the sail on the 13th, a chief by the name of Leicheigu came to us in the company of 24 Chukchi men in two baidars. He assured us that he came especially for us from Metchiglinskaia Bay [sic] [Mechigmenan] where his settlement is, and that he was the son of the chief, Imlerat, who accompanied Captain Billings in his journey to the land of the Chukchi. Hoping, finally, to get the desired deer from him, the captain put to him this request, but according to his assertion, he needed seven days to deliver as many deer as we wanted. The captain, in absence of an emergency, did not dare to waste so much precious time, and we therefore told Leiteigu that he should go, and that we, in a month or a month and a half, would come to Metchiglinskaia Bay, where we would visit him and buy deer. Receiving some presents, he left and promised to pre-
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pare everything that we required for the designated time.
Getting out of the bay with a light SE wind, we bore to the NEN, and moved forward very slowly because we were forced to contend with calms and light headwinds, and only on the 16th were we able to pass Cape Oriental [ East Cape ].
From here we wanted to undertake the survey of the Asiatic shore, but frequent fog and the irregularity of winds switching from the NW through the N to the E and blowing for the most part very lightly, forced us to abandon this plan, and we started to hold as far as possible toward the north.
To the American shore On the 19th the fog cleared and we, being about 30 miles from shore, sighted [Cape] Serdtse Kamen at SW 30˚. From it extended southward along the shore a massive wide ice field, which occupied the whole horizon toward the north. The depth was 24 sazhens, the bottom, black silt. Being at too far a distance from the ice, the captain ordered us to keep toward shore. The depth did not decrease. When we neared the ice, the roar of walruses was heard the whole night long. At dawn we saw thousands of them lying on the ice. Besides that, we saw a lot of driftwood. We were at latitude 67˚ 49' 42˚" and longitude 195˚ 52' 37" E at that time. The ice was solid, and extended in a large semicircle from the Asiatic coast to the NE.
Seeing the impossibility of penetrating farther, and having a lack of firewood, the captain ordered us to keep toward