A MORNING CALL. 271 



keep from striking the stone rafters. Besides, the 

 smell of the place had rather a tendency to fill one's 

 mind with longings for the open air ; but I managed 

 to remain long enough to conclude some important 

 arrangements with my ally and his useful spouse, and 

 then I took my leave with mutual protestations of 

 friendship and good-will. I said to him at parting, 

 '* You are chief and I am chief, and we will both tell 

 our respective people to be good to each other ; " but 

 he answered, " Na, na, I am chief, but you are the 

 great chief, and the Esquimaux will do what you say. 

 The Esquimaux like you, and are your friends. You 

 make them many presents." I might have told him 

 that this all-powerful method of inspiring friendship 

 was not alone appUcable to Esquimaux. 



This visit was a pleasant little episode. I was much 

 pleased at the honest heartiness with which Kalutu- 

 nah entered into my plans ; while the childish sim- 

 plicity of his habits and the frankness of his declara- 

 tions won for him a conspicuous place in my regard. 



He was greatly amused wath our guns, and begged 

 for one of them, declaring that he could sit in his hut 

 and kill the reindeer as they passed by. He would 

 put the gun through the window, and he pointed to a 

 hole in the wall about a foot square, where the light 

 was admitted through a thin slab of hard snow. In 

 the centre of it he had made a round orifice, which he 

 said, laughingly, was for the purpose of looking out 

 for the Nalegaksoak, — a well-turned compliment, if 

 it did come from a savage, and all the more adroit 

 that the orifice was really for ventilation, at least it 

 was the only opening by which the foul air could pos- 

 sibly escape. Both himself and wife were highly de- 

 lighted with the presents which I had brought them 



