Savonga
About 40 miles east-southeast of Gambell is the second and smaller village of the St. Lawrence Island, known as Savonga, which was the object of our next visit. It was here that we were to buy two or three reindeer carcasses, the animals being killed and dressed for us by the natives in an astonishingly short time. The little village is prettily situated on the green flat of the elevated beach. It consists of less than a dozen modern small frame dwellings. One of these, that of the headman, Sapilla (who regrettably died during the following winter), is of two stories—a unique feature for an Eskimo dwelling in these waters. Here we were visited by three boats and the previous scenes were repeated, only, due to the proximity of a rich old site, there were more objects of old ivory.
The captain made me acquainted with Sapilla, whom I found remarkably white-man-like in behavior. Then the ship doctor, not feeling very well after yesterday's storm, filled my pockets with tooth forceps and I was taken to the shore, to see the women and children who would not venture out and to attend to any tooth extraction that might be needed.
We were considerably farther from the shore than even at Gambell, but I was sent on one of our motor boats and so it did not take long to land. Upon landing we came to bright and clean and smiling little groups of women and children, full of color in their cotton dresses, and I was soon in one of their houses. All these dwellings were built by the Eskimo themselves, and it was a most gratifying surprise to find them as clean and wholesome as any similar dwelling of whites could be. Moreover, these houses were furnished with stoves, chairs, tables, crockery and other utensils exactly as if they were those of a good class of whites, with the smell of the seal, which as a rule is so clinging to and characteristic of the Eskimo house, barely perceptible.
It was a busy and interesting hour that I spent at Savonga. I saw probably all the inhabitants that were at home; pulled five teeth—the teeth of these quite civilized people are no more as sound and solid as were those of their fathers and mothers—and found and purchased cheaply many smaller objects of fossil ivory, which they excavate from a near-by old site.
These objects are obtained from an old village located on the coast about 4 miles farther east, on or near the North Cape, visible from our boat. The natives excavate in this site as far as it thaws every summer, and find many objects. They, moreover, make an occasional trip to the two little rocky Punuk islands located about 12 miles south of the East Cape of the St. Lawrence, which, though accurately charted by the Russians as early as 1849, yet until the summer of 1926 remained practically unknown. On one of these islands there is now known to exist an extensive frozen refuse heap, containing large quantities of old ivory implements as well as other objects of scientific interest.
The land visit was a great tonic after the wild and mean preceding night, and I did not relish at all the Bear's whistle calling us away. What a great thing it would be if a revenue cutter could for just one season be given to science!
Sunday, July 25. Left St. Lawrence 9.30 last night, sea quieting. We are now passing, on our right, King Island, isolated rocky mass. Day fair, cool, water getting smooth.
About 50 miles north one can now see plainly Cape Prince of Wales (pl. 5, a), and to the left, hazy, the two Diomedes. We are now 95 miles from St. Lawrence. On really clear days one could see from here even the Asiatic heights. Therefore, from the latter on a clear day one sees the Diomedes, the Cape, the highlands beyond, and King Island, while a little farther south there is on such a day a good view from Asia of the St. Lawrence Island. All this was in good weather easily reached from Asia and must have been utilized from the earliest time in passing onward from one continent to the other.
We can now see also much of the coast in the direction of Teller and the York Mountains behind.
From hour to hour there is growing on one a profound appreciation that the Bering Sea was a most favorable amphitheater of migration, particularly from the less hospitable Asia eastward into America. And practically the whole trend of native movements to this day is from Asia toward America.
Later in the day, now a fine, bright summer day, arrive off Wales. Here again anchor far out. Last year the Bear grounded here and our captain is apprehensive. Wales is a straggly village—or two villages—located on a large, flat sandy spit, dotted with water pools, and projecting from the Seward Peninsula toward Asia. Near by are old sites, probably of much archeological value, and in these for some weeks now excavations have been carried on by Dr. D. Jenness, of the Victoria Memorial Museum of Ottawa. Here also is located an exceptionally educated and observant teacher, Mr. Clark M. Garber.
A big umiak comes to us with many natives bringing the usual trade, and on it, much to my pleasure, are both Doctor Jenness and Mr. Garber. Doctor Jenness asks to go with us to the Little Diomede to do some work there. He has had encouraging experience here, finding evidences of occupation dating many centuries back, and has collected some valuable specimens, including a few with the fine old curved-line decoration. Mr. Garber gives me some valuable information about the skeletal remains of this place and engages to collect for me, who can not leave the boat, a few boxes of these specimens, which promise is fulfilled later.
The natives are a jolly and sturdy lot, even though they bear, and that since their earliest contacts with whites, a rather bad reputation. That this is founded in some fact, at least, is told us in the annals of the Russians, and is also shown by the little structure on the hillside off which we are anchored. This has a tragic and at the same time quaint history. It is the grave of a missionary Doctor Thornton, who was killed, we are told, by two local young fellows. These were apprehended, sentenced to die, and were to be shot by their relatives, which all evidently found quite just. On the appointed day they were taken out to the burial ground, helped to prepare their burials, one asked yet to be allowed to go to the village to get a drink, went and returned, and then both were shot. The executioner of the boy who went to get the drink is said to have been his uncle.