MANNERS OF THE LAPLANDERS. 571 



affections, as well as cerebral and pulmonary congestion, are of 

 common occurrence. To sum up: the already scattered and scanty 

 population of the Arctic Zone is daily decreasing, and will probably 

 be extinct in a few generations. 



The manners of all the Hyperboreans present the same general 

 features : they are peaceable, inoffensive, and reduced, if I may use 

 the expression, to the utmost possible minimum of physical and 

 intellectual activity. This race, or group of races, is represented on 

 the two continents by several distinct peoples. Those most clearly 

 defined are : 



In Europe, the Laplanders (or Lapps), and the Samoiedes ; 



In Asia, the Ostiaks, Yakouts, and Kamtschatdales ; and, 



In North America, the Eskimos (or Esquimaux). 



The Laplanders inhabit the northernmost coasts of the Scandi- 

 navian peninsula. They are ignorant, uncultivated, and torpid, rather 

 than savage. In spite of their frequent contact "with the Russians 

 and the Swedes, they have no industrial resources, no art, no other 

 commerce than that which is afforded by the products of the chase, 

 of their fisheries, or their herds of reindeer. Christianity, to which 

 they were converted about two centuries ago, has not aroused them 

 as yet from their moral and intellectual lethargy. All religion being 

 reduced, so far as they are concerned, to oral tradition, the devotion 

 of each is in proportion to his memory. Education among them has 

 attained to this standard, that a Laplander who knows his alphabet 

 corresponds to a young man among us who has graduated at Oxford 

 or Cambridge. 



A French traveller, M. de Saint-Blaize, furnishes some details 

 respecting this people : 



"The race of Laplanders is constantly diminishing in numbers. 

 It is of Asiatic origin, as may be clearly discerned in their language 

 and the type of their physiognomy. Some are fishers, and dwell 

 upon the coast ; others are shepherds, who traverse the mountains in 

 every direction, pasturing their reindeer on the white moss. During 



