﻿SHAMANISM. 375 



By this channel, previous to the formation of the 

 Russian Fur Company, wares brought from Asia 

 were distributed over seventeen hundred miles of 

 American coast. 



The Rein-deer Tchukche practise shamanism; 

 and though they occasionally beat their shamans to 

 compel them to bring about some event which they 

 desire, this treatment may be considered as evincing 

 a belief in the powers of the sorcerer, and in times 

 of general fear and calamity the shamans have put 

 forth their pretensions with great effect. In 1814, 

 an epidemic having carried off many of the Tchuk- 

 che assembled at the fair of Ostrownoie, the shamans 

 held a consultation, and decided that Kotchen, the 

 most respected of their chiefs, must be sacrificed to 

 appease the wrath of the sj^irits. Neither presents 

 nor severe treatment could prevail on the shamans 

 to alter their decision, and Kotchen, like another 

 Curtius, devoted himself to the infernal gods. The 

 love of his people, however, was such, that none 

 could be prevailed upon to execute the sentence, 

 until his own son, incited by the exhortations of 

 his father, and terrified by his threatened curse, 

 plunged a knife into his heart, and gave the body 

 to the shamans.* 



The tents of the Tchukche, called namet^ have a 

 fire in the centre with an opening for the smoke 



* Wrangell's Polar Sea, translated by Mrs. Sabine, p. 119. 



B B 4 



