CUMBERLAND SOUND AND ITS ESKIMOS. 773 



olfactory nerves, and when I drew the curtain and looked around on 

 the piles of meat, the filthy cooking-vessels, and the heaps of reindeer- 

 skins in the background, I ran out and away as quickly as I could. If 

 any one had told me then that I would soon be living without repug- 

 nance in just such surroundings, I should have resented the msinuation 

 very angrily. But it was not long before the stress of circumstances 

 and custom brought me to it, and I too found myself sharing the deer- 

 skin bed-place of the natives and cooking with them in the same kettle, 

 though I generally took the precaution to use my own. Even the 

 store of meat heaped up in the sides of the hut was often only too 

 welcome to me, as was also the hospitable lamp by which the house- 

 wife sat caring that the wick should be kept well supplied with oil, 

 and should burn evenly without smoking. With what joy, returning 

 from a journey wet and chilled through, did I often greet the cheerful 

 fire which warmed the hut comfortably, and the kindly hostess who 

 dried and cleaned my clothes ; and how haltingly did I as often leave 

 the hospitable roof to go out on my solitary journeys from coast to 

 coast, or into uninhabited regions ! 



The few tents which we found on our arrival at Kikkerton were 

 inhabited by the Eskimos of the Scottish station, while all the other 

 natives had gone fur-hunting ; for as soon as the spring fishing is over 

 and the sound is tolerably free from ice, they go in their boats up the 

 fiords and set up their tents at the extreme ends of them. 



While the women and older men stay here to catch salmon, of 

 which immense numbers abound in the ponds and rivers at this season, 

 the younger and more active go for days' journeys into the interior, 

 sometimes getting as far as a hundred miles or more from their settle- 

 ments. If they kill a large number of reindeer, they only bring the 

 best meat and the skins on their backs to the camp. Then a great 

 feast is given. All the people of the settlement are called together. 

 An open fire of brush blazes under the kettle of meat, and every one 

 has his part in the meal. The skins are carefully preserved, to be made 

 up afterward into winter clothing. A favorite summer resort of the 

 Eskimos is the great Lake Netilling, west of Cumberland Sound, the 

 shore of which is frequented by numerous herds of that animal ; and 

 many start for that place with sledges in May. 



While I was exploring the east coast of the sound with boats in 

 the fall, a large number of Eskimos came back from their summer 

 journeys. Some of them used old whale-boats, which they had got 

 from some ship. The craft were loaded to the edge with the skins 

 obtained during the season. Men, women, and children were singing, 

 laughing, and chattering, dogs were howling, and every once in a while 

 one person or another would reach down into the always-full pot that 

 stood in the middle of the boat. Only the helmsman sat earnest and 

 majestic on his high seat, and steered his craft. If the wind was un- 

 favorable, oars were used. Occasionally a seal would lift his head out 



