04 
THE VOYAGE OF THE VEGA. 
[chap. 
that they formed a close thicket of reindeer horns, which gave 
to the sacrificial mound its peculiar character. 
2. Reindeer skulls with the coronal hone bored through, set 
up on sticks which were stuck in the mound. Sometimes 
there was carved on these sticks a number of faces, the one 
over the other. 
8. A large number of other bones of 
reindeer, among them marrow bones, 
broken for the purpose of extracting the 
marrow. 
4. Bones of the bear, among which 
were observed the paws and the head, 
only half flayed, of a bear which had been 
shot so. recently that the flesh had not 
begun to decompose; alongside of this 
bear’s head there were found two lead 
bullets placed on a stone. 
5. A quantity of pieces of iron, for 
instance, broken axes, fragments of iron 
pots, metal parts of a broken harmonicon, 
&c.; and finally, 
6. The mighty beings to which all this 
splendour was offered. 
They consisted of hundreds of small 
wooden sticks, the upper portions of whicli 
were carved very clumsily in the form of 
the human countenance, most of them from 
fifteen to twenty, but some of them 370 
centimetres in length. They were all 
stuck in the ground on the south-east part 
of the eminence. Near the place of sacrifice there were to be seen 
pieces of driftwood and remains of the fireplace at which the 
sacrificial meal was prepared. Our guide told us that at these 
meals the moutlis of the idols were besmeared with blood and 
CAIRN. 
One-twelfth of natural size. 
