450 
THE VOYAGE OF THE VEGA. 
[chap. 
articles which the man purchased were immediately committed to 
the wife’s keeping. One of the children had round his neck a hand 
of pearls with a Chinese coin having a square hole in the middle, 
suspended from it; another bore a perforated American cent piece. 
None knew a word of Kussian, but here too a youngster could count 
ten in English. They also knew the word “ ship.” In all the tents, 
reindeer stomachs were seen with their contents, or sacks stuffed 
full of other green herbs. Several times we were offered in 
return for the bits of sugar and pieces of tobacco which we dis¬ 
tributed, wrinkled root-bulbs somewhat larger than a hazel nut, 
which had an exceedingly pleasant taste, resembling that of fresh 
nuts. A seal caught in a net among the ice during our visit was 
cut up in the tent by the women. On this occasion they were 
surrounded by a large number of children, who were now and 
then treated to bloody strips of flesh. The youngsters carried 
on the work of cutting up con amove, coquetting a little with 
their bloody arms and faces. 
The rock which prevails in this region consists mainly of gabbro, 
which in the interior forms several isolated, black, plateau-formed 
hills, 100 to 150 metres high, between which an even, grassy, 
but treeless plain extends. It probably rests on sedimentary 
strata. For on the western side of Irkaipij the plutonic rock is 
seen to rest on a black slate with traces of fossils, for the most 
part obscure vegetable impressions, probably belonging to the 
Permian Carboniferous formation. 
Uneasy at the protracted delay here I made an excursion to 
a hill in the neighbourhood of our anchorage, which, according 
to a barometrical measurement, was 129 metres high, in order, 
from a considerable height, to get a better view of the ice than 
was possible by a boat reconnaisance. The hill was called by 
the Chukches llammong-Ommang. From it we had an exten¬ 
sive view of the sea. It was everywhere covered with closely 
packed drift-ice. Only next the land was seen an open channel, 
which, however, was interrupted in an ominous way by belts of ice. 
