Animal Life in Nova Zembla. I4d 



with their upUfled white belUes. The Russians call such a 

 brooding place a bazaar. Thus this Persian word has been 

 transplanted by Russian Walrus-fishers to the rocks of the 

 frozen ocean and applied to birds in default of human inha- 

 bitants. Upon the points of isolated cliffs, and enduring no 

 other birds near it, lives the large grey sea gull [Larusglaucus), 

 which the Dutch whale-fishers, I know not why, whether from 

 respect or a want of it, have named the Burgomaster. It 

 seems to feel itself the lord of this creation, for before a whole 

 company of fishermen it is bold enough to pick and choose 

 from the fish that have been thrown upon the shore. 



These birds are the best proofs that there is more to be had 

 from the bottom of the sea than on land. In fact here the 

 chief sum of animal life is sunk under the surface of the ocean. 

 Small Crustacea are particularly numerous here, and above all 

 the Gammari, which gather as thickly around a piece of flesh 

 thrown into the water as do the gnats in Lapland about a 

 warm-blooded animal. With a sieve one may take them up by 

 thousands. When we threw lines in Matotschkin-Schar, the 

 Walrus-fishers, who never took this trouble assured us that it 

 would be quite in vain, for in the first place there were hardly 

 any fish there, and moreover the Kapschaki (thus they call the 

 Gammari) completely consume within a few hours sometimes 

 the bait and sometimes the fish as soon as it is dead. In fact 

 we seldom drew up anything but our empty lines. 



Scanty as is the vegetation, it yet feeds a quantity of lem- 

 mings. Gentle declivities are frequently burrowed through 

 in every direction by them. But the number of animals is 

 not near so great as might be supposed from the quantity of 

 burrows ; for by far the greater part are empty, which one may 

 soon be convinced of by tracking them with dogs, but never- 

 theless their number is so considerable as to force us to ask 

 how so many lemmings can find support upon such a vegeta-r 

 tion. But it is also not impossible that the vegetation ap-r 

 pears so small to the observer because the lemmings make a 

 considerable portion of it invisible. If they devoured the roots 

 not much of the vegetable kingdom of Nova Zembla could long 

 remain, and the lemmings themselves would soon perish from 

 want of nourishment. But those captured by us could in no 



