1868.] MR. U. BROWN ON THE MAMMALS OF GREENLAND. .3.")" 



Eskimo camping-places in the summer, and are housed in the 

 winter. I am told that they will eat dried Arctic Salmon, if nothing 

 better is forthcoming. It is not kept north of Holsteensborg, as it 

 is found impossible to keep it where there are troops of savage 

 dogs ; and it is accordingly only found about the settlements south 

 of that, to the number of about 100.] 



5. On some of the doubtful or mythical Animals of Greenland. 



Otto Fabricius used to spend his summers roaming about with 

 the Eskimo, until he had learned to manage a kayak and strike a 

 Seal with a skill which few Europeans can ever acquire. On one of 

 these excursions he found in " Sildefjord, north of the colony of 

 Fredrikshaab," a piece of a skull, about which the natives told him 

 something ; and from what they related to him, and what he thought 

 himself, he entered no less than two species in the Greenland 

 fauna, "Trichechus manatus" (^Rhytina gigas) and " Phoca ursina" 

 (Callorhinus ursinus), being, apparently, not certain to which it be- 

 longed. The Greenlanders called this animal AuvekcBJak, or Auikee- 

 jak, and said it was like a Walrus and broke things easily to pieces. 

 He was sure that the piece of skull belonged to the first of these 

 animals ; and again he repeats the same under the head of Phoca 

 ursina ; so that it is now difficult to arrive at any conclusion regard- 

 ing the species of animal to which it belonged. However, I think 

 there can be but one opinion, that neither the Sea-Bear nor the 

 Rhytina can be entered in the Greenland fauna on such fragmentary 

 evidence. The confused stories of the Greenlanders can give the 

 critic no great hold. 



This piece of cranium is not now to be found in Fabricius's Mu- 

 seum. In a posthumous zoological manuscript, entitled " Zoolo- 

 giske Samlinger," written in Copenhagen during the period between 

 1808 and 1814, and now preserved in the Royal Library, he has 

 again spoken about the Auvekayak (Bd. ii. p. 298, no. 286), and 

 has thus written about the skull he found in Greenland : — 



" The head which I found was full of holes, and looked like that 

 of a Walrus (no. 82), without tusks." 



There were many long small teeth in the head *; and if such was 

 the case, we cannot be wrong in saying that the animal was not a 

 Mammal. We have, however, no right, when we remember the 

 clear comprehensive style in which Fabricius wrote regarding the 

 Greenland fauna, however much we may be inclined, to say that the 

 whole veas erroneous. 



It is unfortunate that when Fabricius referred his Aiivekcejak to the 

 Sea-cow of Steller, he was not acquainted with that animal, and did 

 not know of the horn-plates; for, if he had, it is impossible that 

 he could have found a resemblance to it in the Auvekaejak. His words 

 regarding it are clear enough, so far as they go — " Rarissimum ani- 

 mal in mari Groenlandico, cujus soliun cranium ex parte conservatum 

 commune cum sequent! specie ab incolis dictum nomine Anvekse- 

 * ReinViarrlt. loc. cif. p. 6. 



