e lived pure Eskimo. Among them we found a Chukch woman
who informed us that there were Chukch villages also on the American
side of Behring's Strait, north of Prince of Wales Cape. These
cannot, however, be very numerous or populous, as they are not
mentioned in the accounts of the various English expeditions to
those regions, they die not noticed for instance in Dr. JOHN
SIMPSON'S instructive memoir on the Eskimo at Behring's Straits.

We were unable during the voyage of the _Vega_ to obtain any data
for estimating the number of the reindeer-Chukches. But the number
of the coast Chukches may be arrived at in the following way.
Lieutenant Nordquist collected from the numerous foremen who rested
at the _Vega_ information as to the names of the encampments which
are to be found at present on the coast between Chaun Bay and
Behring's Straits, and the number of tents at each village. He thus
ascertained that the number of the tents in the coast villages
amounts to about 400. The number of inhabitants in every tent may
be, according to our experience, averaged at five. The population on
the line of coast in question may thus amount to about 2,000, at
most to 2,500, men, women, and children. The number of the
reindeer-Chukches appears to be about the same. The whole population
of Chukch Land may thus now amount to 4,000 or 5,000 persons. The
Cossack Popov already mentioned, reckoned in 1711 that all the
Chukches, both reindeer-owning and those with fixed dwellings,
numbered 2,000 persons. Thus during the last two centuries, if these
estimates are correct, this Polar race has doubled its numbers.

In order to give the reader an idea of the language of the Chukches,
I have in a preceding chapter given an extract from the large
vocabulary which Nordquist has collected. There appear to be no
dialects differing very much from each other. Whether foreign words
borrowed from other Asiatic languages have been adopted in Chukch we
have not been able to make out. It is certain that no Russian words
are used. The language strikes me as articulate and euphonious. It
is nearly allied to the Koryaek, but so different from other, both
East-Asiatic and American, tongues, that philologists have not yet
succeeded in clearing up the relationship of the Chukches to other
races.

Like most other Polar tribes, the Chukches now do not belong to any
unmixed race. This one is soon convinced of, if he considers
attentively the inhabitants of a la