An Anthropogeographical Study of the Origin of the Eskimo Culture. 141 
miles spreads over the plain like a shroud, while the sky, which generally is 
overcast, is arched over it all like a changeless, grey bell. No tree, no bush shows 
the way for the traveller, no house and no totem pole beckon kindly in the 
distance. Only the flat roundish Eskimo huts project a few feet above the 
plain, if they are not entirely hidden in the snow which often happens.” 
The fauna of the Delta is characterized especially by its wealth of fishes 
and by its numerous migratory birds during summer. On the other hand, the 
reindeer is no longer found between the Yukon and the Kuskoquim, and it is, 
on the whole, rather doubtful whether these swampy regions with their pre- 
dominantly mossy vegetation were ever liked by the reindeer herds that are 
found to this day immediately north and south of the Delta. After the Mackenzie 
Eskimo, there are no Eskimo who are provided so easily and abundantly with 
wood as the people at the Yukon and Kuskoquim, which rivers come from forest 
regions and carry drift-wood. According to WRANGELL the mouths of the rivers 
may even at times be blocked with tree trunks. 
The chief article of food is, as already mentioned, fish. JACOBSEN! reports 
about this that the dried and slightly smoked salmon (Yukala) is the chief article 
of subsistence. — "They are ichthyophagists in the real sense of the word.” 
Those families who neglect to put by stores of fish suffer famine during the winter. 
On the other hand, the Yukon Eskimo have not, like so many of the hitherto 
mentioned groups, the opportunity to carry on reindeer hunting largely in the 
autumn. Fish is, therefore, their only stored-up food apart from the blubber 
from seals which were hunted on the coast-ice in the spring, and White Whale 
which was hunted in the late summer. In this way the Delta inhabitants visit 
the sea twice a year. In the spring the journey is made in a dog sledge, for which 
reason they have to be back before the river ice breaks up. On the second jour- 
ney the kayak is used. 
It is very doubtful, however, whether this description applies to the Eskimo 
who live at a greater distance from the sea. Probably these live in their settle- 
ments all the year round, where, like the Indians at the Yukon proper, they 
carry on fishing from the open waters during the summer, and from openings 
in the ice during the winter; but as they are without the Indians” hunting of 
big game, such as elk and reindeer, as also the eventual seal and White-Whale 
hunting of the coast inhabitants, their means of subsistence is more scanty, 
and their life more monotonous, even if their existence is sufficiently assured 
by reason of the great abundance of fish in the many arteries and lakes. Ac- 
cording to PETROFF one could as late as in 1880 reckon over 6000 real Delta 
inhabitants. | 
One must by no means confound this more monotonous and indigent 
existence with a primitive state of culture, as Втхк has allowed himself to be 
beguiled into doing. The culture in the unattractive swamp delta with the easy 
access to fish-food and unnecesariness of carrying out most of the Eskimo occu- 
pations is not characterized by primitiveness, but by decay. The implements 
г Wont, р. 190. 
