IX.] 
EXAMINATION OF ONKILON RUINS. 
445 
found implements of stone and bone, among which were stone 
axes, which, after lying 250 years in the earth, were still fixed 
to their handles of wood or bone. Even the thongs with which 
the axe had been bound fast to, or iveclged into, the handle, were 
still remaining. The tusks of the walrus ^ had to the former 
inhabitants of the place, as to the Chukches of the present, 
yielded a material which in many cases may be used with 
greater advantage than flint for spear-heads, bird-arrows, fish¬ 
hooks, ice-axes, &c. Walrus tusks, more or less worked, accord¬ 
ingly were found in the excavations in great abundance. The 
bones of the whale had also been employed on a great scale, but 
we did not find any large pieces of mammoth tusks, an indication 
that the race was not in any intimate contact with the inhabi¬ 
tants of the regions to the westward, so rich in the remains of 
the mammoth.^ At many places the old Onkilon houses were 
used by the Chukches as stores for blubber; and at others, 
excavations had been made in the refuse heaps in search of 
walrus tusks. Our researches were regarded by the Chukches 
with mistrust. An old man who came, as it were by chance, 
from the interior of the country past the place where we worked, 
remained there a while, regarding our labours with apparent 
indifference, until he convinced himself that from simplicity, or 
1 The walrus now appears to be very rare in the sea north of Behring’s 
Straits, but formerly it must have been found there in large numbers, and 
made that region a veritable paradise for every hunting tribe. While we 
during our long stay there saw only a few walruses, Cook, in 1778, saw an 
enormous number, and an interesting drawing of walruses is to be found 
in the account of his third voyage. A Voyage to the Pacific Ocean, etc. 
Vol. III. (by James King), London, 1784, p. 259, pi. 52. 
2 The greatest number of mammoth tusks is obtained from the stretches 
of land and the islands between the Chatanga and Chaim Bay. Here the 
walrus is wanting. The inhabitants of North Siberia therefore praise the 
wisdom of the Creator, who lets the walrus live in the regions where the 
mammoth is wanting, and has scattered mammoth ivory in the earthy layers 
of the coasts where the walrus does not occur (A. Erman, Reise um die 
Erde, Berlin, 1833—48, D, 1, B. 2, p. 264). 
