COMMON SEAL. 157 
fat and flefh, and keep it for winter’s provifions, and they may ber 
preferved a whole year without fpoiling. 
The Kamt/chatkans have a mott fingular ceremony. After they take Superstrriove 
the flefh from the heads of the Seals, they bring a veffel in form rat alae 
of a canoe, and fling into it all the {culls, crowned with certain herbs, 
and place them onthe ground. A certain perfon enters the habita- 
tion with a fack filled with Tonchitche, {weet herbs, and a little of the 
bark of willow. Two of the natives then roll a great ftone towards the 
door, and cover it with pebbles; two others take the fweet herbs 
and difpofe them, tied in little packets. The great ftone is to 
fignify the fea-fhore, the pebbles the waves, and the packets Seals. 
They then bring three difhes of a hafh, called Tolkoucha ; of this 
they make little balls, in the middle of which they ftick the packets 
of herbs: of the willow-bark they make a little canoe, and fill it. 
with To/koucha, and cover it with the fack. After fome time, the 
two Kamt/chatkans who had put the mimic Seals into the Tolkoucha, 
take the balls, and a veffel refembling a canoe, and draw it along the 
fand, as if it was on the fea, to convince the real Seals how agreeable 
it would be to them to come among the Kamt/chatkans, who have & 
fea in their very jurts, or dwellings. And this they imagine will in- 
duce the Seals to fuffer themfelves to be taken in great numbers. 
Various other ceremonies, equally ridiculous, are practifed ; in one: 
of which they invoke the winds, which drive the Seals on their fooresy, 
to be propitious *. 
Befides the ufes which are made of the flefh and fat of Seals, the 
fkins of the largeft are cut into foles for fhoes. The women make 
their fummer boots of the undreffed fkins, and wear them with the 
hair outmoft. In a country which abounds fo greatly in furs, very 
little more ufe is made of the fkins of Seals in the article of drefs: 
than what has been mentioned +. But the Koriaks, the Oloutores, and 
Tchut/chi, form.with the fkins canoes and veffels of different fizes,. 
fome large enough to carry thirty people. 
* Defer. Kamt{chatha; 4256 + The fame, 41, 42, 424. 
Seals 
