276 
THE VOYAGE OF THE VEGA. 
[chap. 
discovered, but the last was killed on Behring Island in 1768, 
and none has been seen since then.” 
On the ground of the writings of which I have given an 
account above, and of various pieces of information collected 
during this century from the Russian authorities in the region, 
by the skilful conservator Wosnessenski, the academicians von 
Baer and Brandt ^ came to the conclusion that the sea-cow 
had scarcely been seen by Europeans before the y’th Flovember, 
1741, when Steller, the day after his landing on Behring Island, 
for the first time saw some strange animals pasturing with 
their heads under water on the shores of the island; and that 
the animal twenty-seven years afterwards, or in 1768, was com¬ 
pletely exterminated. The latter statement however is un¬ 
doubtedly incorrect; for, in the course of the many inquiries I 
made of the natives, I obtained distinct information that living 
sea-cows had been seen much later. A creole (that is, the 
offspring of a Russian and an Aleutian), who was sixty-seven 
years of age, of intelligent appearance and in the full possession 
of his mental faculties, stated “that his father died in 1847 at 
the age of eighty-eight. He had come from Volhynia, his 
native place, to Behring Island at the age of eighteen, accordingly 
in 1777. The two or three first years of his stay there, i.e. till 
1779 or 1780, sea-cows were still being killed as they pastured 
on sea-weed. The heart only was eaten, and the hide used for 
haydcLTS? In consequence of its thickness the hide was split 
the first arrival of the Russians at Kamchatka the sea-cow actually visited 
occasionally the coasts of that peninsula. It is probable that in former 
times the sea-cow was to be met with as far south as the north part of 
Japan. Some scientific men have even conjectured that the animal may 
have occurred north of Behring’s Straits. This however is improbable. 
Among the mass of subfossil bones of marine animals which we examined 
at Pitlekaj the bones of the sea-cow did not appear to be present. 
1 Von Baer’s and Brandt’s numerous writings on the sea-cow are to be 
found in the publications of the St. Petersburg Academy. 
" That the hide of the sea-cow was used for haydars is evident from the 
short extract given from Korovin’s voyage. On hearing this “ creole’s ” 
