29=6 Or Kitig on the Physicai Characters of the Esquimaux, 



naiS made the same rema,rk,* probably a quotation from Lieut. 

 Roger Curtis. Thorsin, the Icelander, describes the people of 

 Winlandt as of low stature, having boats covered with leather. 

 Now, it has been contended, and very ably, that Winland was 

 Tsonth of the Gulph of St Lavn'ence ; and since we have been 

 able to trace the Esquimaux thus far, it is by no means im- 

 probable that they took advantage of the mighty St Lawrence 

 and penetrated inland ; for near the Falls of Niagara have been 

 discovered numerous tumuli, attributed by the Red man, who 

 'does not adopt this mode of sepulture, to an extinct race that 

 inhabited the country before him. Dr Hodgkin, with his usual 

 intelligence and research, examined a skull exhumed from 

 one of these tumuli, and pointed out its strong resemblance to 

 'the skull of a known Esquimaux. A cast of the former and 

 ^he original of the latter, is to be seen in the Museum of Guy'is 

 Hospital, arranged by Dr Hodgkin, a museum deservedly the 

 pride of this country and the admiration of foreigners. 



Of that all-important branch of science — statistics, in l^a- 

 tion to the Esquimaux, our knowledge is but slight. The popula- 

 tion of the north-west coast of America, from Prince William^s 

 Sound to Point Barrow, was estimated, in 1822, at 1200 ; of 

 Hegenfs Inlet, in 1830, at 160 ; of Melville Peninsula, in 

 1823, at 219 ; and of Labrador, in 1773, at 1623. It appears 

 evident, then, as far as our information extends, that the north- 

 west corner of America, Labrador, and Greenland, are bettet 

 inhabited than the American boundary of the Polar Sea, and 

 that the population gradually increases in the direction from 

 east to west, except in the neighbourhood of the Mackenzie, 

 where perhaps from the resources of the country, compared 

 witli any other given area, it is most abundantly peopled. 



The Esquimaux all speak radically the same language, and 

 even where there exist dialectrical differences, they are so 

 slight, that a native, whether he is located on the shores of 

 the Pacific or of the Atlantic, is able to make himself under- 

 stood throughout all the various and widely spread commu- 

 nities. 



The author of "Researches into the Physical History off 



• 1^18. t lOth century. 



