394 FOUR YEARS IN THE WHITE NORTH 



one of the most successful hunters of the tribe, for he 

 brought forth a large supply of bear meat, walrus, seal, 

 birds, narwhal blubber, and all the other delicacies of 

 the Eskimo larder, on which we gorged ourselves to 

 maintain our reputations as successful eaters. I made 

 rapid progress in adapting myself to the food of the 

 land, for the morning of our departure I managed to 

 make away with a piece of blubber at least five pounds 

 in weight; by so doing I won the approbation of all 

 present, including Rasmussen. 



Another long march from Akpan to Savikseevik, with 

 a brief visit at the settlement on Cape York, brought 

 us to the village nearest the meteorite. Savikseevik is 

 a village of three igloos, not far from the place where 

 Peary obtained the largest of his meteorites; the name 

 means in Eskimo "the place where the ironstone is 

 missing." We rested from the afternoon of one day until 

 the forenoon of the next before going to the Rasmussen 

 meteorite. 



The drivers of Savikseevik took us to Ironstone 

 Mountain. The way thither led over snow-drifted, 

 hummocky, old ice that had lain in the bay for a number 

 of years; bear tracks, old and fresh, formed a veritable 

 network over the whole expanse, but we saw none of 

 the monarchs of the ice-fields. We reached the foot of 

 the mountain just at noonday. We tied our dogs secure- 

 ly to the ice-foot and started up the steep slope. 



We tramped about a mile and a half or two miles be- 

 fore we came to the mountain-top upon which the 

 meteorite lay. The Eskimos soon found the pillar-like 

 boulder of white gneiss that Koodlooktoo had set up to 

 mark the meteorite; the meteorite itself, a large rusty 

 block of nickel-iron alloy, was buried deep under the 



