These people worship idols, which look like dolls made of skin, and which they always carry with them on their travels. Some of these idols, or gods, have faces of brass or copper, and some carry bows made of forged iron. The Samoyeds worship by making pilgrimages to certain spots, where they offer sacrifices and make vows; they eat the flesh of their victims, and besmear their idols with the blood. At these sacred places there are piles of bones and skulls of the reindeer, with the horns. Near by are also found quantities of old iron, and hundreds of small wooden sticks, carved to look like human faces.
A Samoyed Family in Winter Costume.
It was to this Samoyed country that the Russian government used to send her criminals, and there are many exiles living there now; but the natives treat them very kindly and never inquire into the cause of their banishment.
As Nordenskjöld and his companions traveled on, they saw large masses of driftwood lying along the shores of the river. This driftwood is carried by the current out into the Arctic ocean, and is often picked up by explorers on the North American and Greenland shores, a fact which seems to prove that the ocean currents carry it across the polar sea. At length the travelers entered the region from which this driftwood comes. This is the great forest belt of Siberia, the largest in the world, extending, with but little interruption, from the Ural mountains to the Sea of Okhotsk. It consists mainly of enormous pines, growing thickly, and untouched by the ax of the lumberman. Many trees are withered with age; others are fallen, and their decayed trunks are covered with mosses and lichens. The wilderness is so vast that a man might wander hundreds of miles without meeting a human being.
Beyond the forest belt lie the fertile plains, which are partly cultivated and which supply Europe with wheat. Nordenskjöld visited these plains, or steppes, and then proceeded homeward overland, by way of St. Petersburg. The next year, 1876, Nordenskjöld made a second voyage from Sweden to the mouth of the Yenisei river, proving beyond a doubt that there is a sea route from the Atlantic to the mouth of the great Siberian river. For this achievement he was regarded by Russia as a national benefactor and publicly thanked.
Nordenskjöld hoped that the rich produce of central Asia, the gold, silver, copper, iron, and coal, the ivory, timber, wheat, and furs, might now be shipped through the rivers to the Arctic ocean and thence to Europe. The dangers of navigation through the ice, however, are so great that it is doubtful whether this route can ever become an important one for purposes of commerce.
Nordenskjöld was not yet satisfied with the work he had accomplished in the Arctic regions. He longed to do what Arctic explorers had been trying to do for three hundred years; namely, to find a northeast passage to the Pacific. Supported by King Oscar of Sweden and by Mr. Oscar Dickson of Gothenburg, Nordenskjöld sailed from Tromsö in his ship, the Vega, July 21, 1878, accompanied by three other vessels. Two of the vessels left him at the mouth of the Yenisei and proceeded up that river, while the other, the Lena, accompanied the Vega eastward. The fog caused the sailors more trouble than the ice, but one day the mist rose, showing a dark ice-free cape. Then Nordenskjöld knew that he had succeeded in reaching the northernmost point of the Old World, Cape Tcheliuskin (Chelyuskin).
More than a century earlier, Lieutenant Tcheliuskin, a Russian officer, had succeeded in reaching this most northern point of Siberia, traveling overland by sledge. Many explorers had tried to reach Cape Tcheliuskin by water, but up to this time all had failed. Nordenskjöld and his companions were very proud of their success. Flags were hoisted, salutes fired, and the officers drank toasts in honor of the occasion.
