488 THE VOYAGE OF THE VEGA. [chap. 



lamp there is always another vessel intended to receive the 

 train-oil which may possibly be spilled. 



In summer the natives also cook with wood in the open air 

 or in the outer tent, in winter only in the greatest necessity in 

 the latter. For they find the smoke, which the wood gives off^ 

 in the close tent, unendurable. Although driftwood is to be 

 found in great abundance on the beach, scarcity of train-oil 

 was evidently considered by the natives as great a misfortune 

 as scarcity of food. Uinga eek, no fuel (properly, no fire), was 

 the constant cry even of those who drew loads of driftwood 

 on board to earn bread for themselves. The circumstance that 

 their fuel does not give off any smoke has the advantage that 

 the eyes of the Chukches are not usually nearly so much 

 attacked as those of the Lapps. 



In the tent the women have always a watchful eye over the 

 trimming of the lamp and the keeping up of the fire. The 

 wooden pins slie uses to trim the wick, and which naturally are 

 drenched with train-oil, are used when required as a light 

 or torch in the outer tent, to light pipes, &c. In the same way 

 other pins dipped in train-oil are used.' Clay lamps are made 

 by the Chukches themselves, the clay being well kneaded and 

 moistened with urine. The burning is incomplete, and is indeed 

 often wholly omitted. 



Train-oil and other liquid wares are often kept in sacks of 

 seal-skin, consisting of whole hides, out of which the body has 

 been taken through the opening made by cutting off the head, 

 and in which all holes, either natural or caused by the killing of 

 the animal, have been firmly closed. In one of the forepaws 

 there is then inserted with great skill a wooden air- and water- 

 tight cock with spigot and faucet. In sacks intended for dry 

 wares the paws are also cut off, and the opening through which 

 the contents are put in and taken out is made right across the 

 breast immediately below the forepaws. 



Fire is lighted partly in the way common in Sweden some 

 decades ago by means of flint and steel, partly by means of a 

 drill implement. In the former case the steel generally consists 

 of a piece of a file or some other old steel tool, or of pieces of 

 iron or steel which have been specially forged for the purpose. 

 Commonly the form of this tool indicates a European or 

 Eussian-Siberian origin, but I also acquired clumsily hammered 

 pieces of iron, which appeared to form specimens of native skill 

 in forging. A Chukch showed me a large fire-steel of the last 

 mentioned kind, provided with a special handle of copper 

 beautifully polished by long-continued use. He evidently 



^ I have seen such pins, also oblong stones, sooty at one end, which, 

 after having been dipped in train-oil, have been used as torches, l.dd by the 

 bide of corpses in old Eskimo graves in north-western Greenland. 



