CHAP. XIV.] 



THE ESKIMO AT PORT CLARENCE. 



579 



On the north side of the harbour we found an old Euro- 

 pean or American train-oil b(jiling establishment. In the 

 neighbourhood of it were two Eskimo graves. The corpses had 

 been laid on the ground fully clothed, without the protection 

 of any coffin, but surrounded by a close fence consisting of a 

 number of tent poles driven crosswise into the ground. Along- 

 side one of the corpses lay a kayak with oars, a loaded double- 

 barrelled gun with locks at half-cock and caps on, various other 

 weapons, clothes, tinderbox, snow-shoes, drinking-vessels, two 

 masks carved in wood and smeared with blood (figures 1 and 

 2, page 581), and strangely-shaped animal figures. Such 

 were seen also in the tents. Bags of sealskin, intended to be 

 inflated and fastened to haq^oons as floats, were sometimes 

 ornamented with small faces carved in wood (figure 3, page 

 581). In one of the two amulets of the same kind, which 



ISKJMO GRAVE. 



(After a drawing by O. Noruquist.) 



I brought home with me, one eye is represented by a piece 

 of blue enamel stuck in, and the other by a piece of iron 

 pyrites fixed in the same way. Behind two tents were found, 

 erected on posts a metre and a half in height, roughly-formed 

 wooden images of birds with expanded wings painted red. I 

 endeavoured without success to purchase these tent-idols^ for 

 a large new felt hat — an article of exchange for which in other 

 cases I could obtain almost anything whatever. A dazzlingly 

 Avhite kayak of a very elegant shape, on the other hand, 

 I purchased without difficulty for an old felt hat and 500 

 Remington cartridges. 



As a peculiar proof of the ingenuity of the Americans when 

 ( .ffering their goods fur sale, it may be mentioned in conclusion 

 that an Eskimo, who came to the vessel during our stay in the 

 harbour, showed us a printed paper, by which a commercial house 



1 The Eskimo however, like the Chukches, do not appear to have any 

 proper religion or idea of a life after this. 



P P 2 



