172 FOUR YEARS IN THE WHITE NORTH [July 



On the afternoon of the 13th, as we proceeded up the 

 coast in our kayaks toward Anoritok, the whole sea 

 was a molten bed of silver as calm and placid as a 

 mountain pool. A beautiful glow over the heights of 

 Ellesmere Land, with here and there a golden-lit peak 

 and a deep fiord bathed in sunshine, lent to the whole 

 scene the spirit of enchantment. It was on such days 

 that one got homesick, and strange to say, not for home 

 and friends; one regretted the near approach of our 

 time of departure from the North Country, a separation 

 that might be for all time. 



At Anoritok three large narwhal and a happy group 

 of Eskimos were congregated at the edge of the ice. 

 Their raw narwhal-skin was a delicacy, yet it was quickly 

 laid aside for the dozens of golden nuggets which we 

 gave them from the nests of the eider duck. It was 

 good to see the Eskimos again, to hear them laugh, and 

 to hear them tell their stories. 



On the 18th it blew great guns and rained atrociously. 

 Happily the Eskimo tupik is well built and of ideal 

 shape to stand the onslaughts of the wind from the big 

 hills; with its covering of sealskin firmly braced within 

 by its many poles and held without by its ring of heavy 

 rocks, it stands almost as a part of Mother Earth, strong 

 and resisting to the end. 



Within a few feet of our tent sat the petrified figure 

 of a woman huddled in skins, looking out over Smith 

 Sound covered with its field of ice, and patiently awaiting 

 the return of her adopted son, a small polar bear which 

 had wandered off into the unknown many years ag 

 and had failed to return. A strange, pathetic figure and 

 one which enters largely into the tales and traditions of 

 the Smith Sound tribe. The Eskimos have not for- 



