At such entertainments the moucho-more, a deleterious species of mushroom, was usually introduced, as a mode of intoxication. Taken in small quantities, it is said to excite an agreeable hilarity of spirits; but if immoderately used, it will produce insanity of several days' duration. Animated by these enjoyments, the host and guests found mutual amusement in the exercise of their peculiar talent of mimicking men and animals.
The children when grown up showed little affection for their parents, neglected them in old age, and did not even consider it a violation of filial duty to kill them when they became burdensome. They also murdered their defective or weakly children, to spare them the misery of a languishing existence. They did not bury their dead, but dragged the corpse into the open air, by a thong tied about the neck, and left it a prey to dogs; under the belief, that those devoured by these animals, would in another world be drawn by the best dogs.
The mode of solemnizing marriages among the Kamtschatkans was tedious, and, on the part of the bridegroom, attended with many difficulties. A man who wished to marry a girl went to the house of her parents, and without farther declaration took his share in the domestic labours. He thus became the servant of the family, and was obliged to obey all their behests, till he succeeded in winning the favour of the girl and her parents. This might continue for years, and even in the end he was liable to be dismissed, without any compensation for his trouble. If, however, the maiden was pleased, and the parents were satisfied with him, they gave him permission to catch his beloved; from this moment the girl took all possible pains to avoid being alone with him, defended herself with a fishing-net and numerous girdles, all which were to be cut through with a stone knife, while all the family were upon the watch to rescue her at the first outcry: the unfortunate lover had probably no sooner laid hands upon his bride than he was seized by her relations, beaten, and dragged away by his hair; yet was he compelled to conquer and overpower her resistance, or to continue in unrewarded servitude. When, however, the catching was accomplished, the fair one herself proclaimed the victory, and the marriage was celebrated.
The present Kamtschatkans are an extremely good-natured, hospitable, timid people; in colour and features nearly resembling the Chinese and Japanese. They all profess the Christian religion; but secretly retain many of their heathen customs, particularly that of killing their deformed children.
The town, or rather village, adjoining the harbour of St. Peter and St. Paul, where the present Governor of Kamtschatka, Captain Stanizky, resides, though the principal place in the peninsula, contains but few convenient houses. The rest, about fifty in number, are mere huts, irregularly scattered up the side of a mountain. The inhabitants of this place, which bears the same name as the harbour, are all Russians, officers of the crown, sailors, disbanded soldiers, and some insignificant traders.
The Kamtschatkans live inland in little villages on the banks of the rivers, but seldom on the sea-coast.
From Krusenstern's representation, Kamtschatka appears very little altered in five-and-twenty years. The only advance made in that period, consists in the cultivation of potatoes by the inhabitants of St. Peter and St. Paul, and the entire water-carriage of various goods and necessaries of life, which were formerly needlessly enhanced in price by being brought overland, through Siberia to Ochotsk.
The northern part of the peninsula and the adjoining country, even to the icy sea, is inhabited by the Tschuktschi, a warlike nomad tribe, removing with celerity from place to place by means of their reindeer. They were not so easily conquered as the Kamtschatkans, and for five-and-thirty years incessantly annoyed the Russians, to whom they now only pay a small tribute in skins. Our cannon at length forced a peace upon them, which had not been long concluded, before there was reason to apprehend a breach of its conditions on their part, and an ambassador was sent to their Tajon, or chief, to discover their intentions. The chief drew a long knife from a sheath at his side, presented it to the ambassador, making him observe that it had a broken point, and addressed him as follows: "When my father died he gave me this knife, saying, 'My son, I received this broken knife from my uncle, whom I succeeded in the dignity of Tajon, and I promised him never to sharpen it against the Russians, because we never prosper in our combats with them; I therefore enjoin thee also to enter into no strife with them till this knife shall of itself renew its point.' You see that the knife is still edgeless, and my father's last will is sacred to me."
According to an accurate census taken of the population of Kamtschatka in the year 1822, it amounts, with the exception of the Tschuktschi, who cannot be computed, to two thousand four hundred and fifty-seven persons of the male, and one thousand nine hundred and forty-one of the female sex. Of these, the native Kamtschatkans were only one thousand four hundred and twenty-eight males, and one thousand three hundred and thirty females; the rest were Koriaks and Russians. They possessed ninety-one horses, seven hundred and eighteen head of cattle, three thousand eight hundred and forty-one dogs, and twelve thousand reindeer, the latter belonging exclusively to the Koriaks.