590 THE VOYAGE OF THE VEGA. [chap. 



shore, evidently belonging to the same species as those we 

 collected at the shore-dunes at Pitlekaj. In the neighbourhood 

 of the tents graves were also found. The corpses had been 

 placed, unburned, in some cleft among the rocks which are split 

 up by the frost, and often converted into immense stone mounds. 

 They had afterwards been covered with stones, and skulls of 

 the bear and the seal and whale-bones had been offered or 

 scattered around the grave. 



North-east of the anchorage the shore was formed of low hills 

 rising with a steep slope from the sea. Here and there ruinlike 

 cliffs projected from the hills, resembling those we saw on the coast 

 of Chukch Land. But the rock here consisted of the same sort of 

 granite Avhich formed the lowermost stratum at Konyam Bay. It 

 was principally at the foot of these slopes that the natives erected 

 their dwellings. South-west of the anchorage commenced a very 

 extensive plain, which towards the interior of the island was 

 marshy, but along the coast formed a firm, even, grassy meadow 

 exceedingly rich in flowers. It was gay with the large sunflower- 

 like Arnica Pseudo- Arnica, and another species of Senecio {Scnccio 

 frigidus) ; the Oxytropis nigrcscens, close-tufted and rich in flowers, 

 not stunted here as in Chukch Land ; several species of Pedicu- 

 laris in their fullest bloom (P. sudetica, P. Langsdorfii, P. Ocderi 

 and P. cwpitata) ; the stately snow auricula {Primula nivalis), 

 and the pretty Primula horealis. As characteristic of the 

 vegetation at this place may also be mentioned several ranunculi, 

 ail anemone (Anemone narcissijiora), a species of monkshood 

 with flowers few indeed, bui so much the larger on that account, 

 large tufts oi Silene acaulis and Alsine niacrocarpa, studded with 

 flowers, several Saxifrages, two Claytoniai, the CI. aeutifolia, 

 important as a food-plant in the housekeeping of the Chukches, 

 and the tender CI. sarmentosa with its delicate, slightly rose- 

 coloured flowers, and, where the ground was stony, long but yet 

 flowerless, slightly green tendrils of the favourite plant of our 

 homeland, the Linncea horcalis. Dr. Kjellman thus reaped a rich 

 harvest of higher plants ; and a fine collection of land and marine 

 animals, lichens and algse was also made here. The ground 

 consisted of sand in which lay large granite blocks, which we in 

 Sweden would call erratic. They appeared however not to have 

 1 )een transported hither, but to be lying in situ, having along with 

 the sand probably arisen through the disintegration of the rocks. 

 In the sea we found not a few algse and a true littoral 

 evertebrate-fauna, poor in species indeed, something which is 

 completely absent in the Polar seas proper. As I walked along 

 the coast I saw five pretty large self-coloured greyish-brown seals 

 sunning themselves on stones a short distance from land. They 

 belonged to a species which I had never seen in the Polar seas. 

 As there was no boat at hand, I forbade the hunters that accom- 



