92 The Musk-ox 



has been hunted for years by the Eskimo and Indians. Barter 

 Island, near Camden Bay, has been the rendezvous of the 

 north coast Eskimo for years, where they meet every summer 

 to barter and trade with each other. At one of these mid- 

 summer festivals there may be seen spotted reindeer skins 

 from Siberia, walrus ivory and walrus skins from Bering Sea, 

 or the stone lamps from the land of the CogmoHks (the far- 

 away people) of the East, and it is not impossible, though 

 hardly probable, that musk-ox skins might be found there. 



I also travelled through the country of the Kookpugmioots 

 and Abdugmioots of the Arctic Coast, east of the Mackenzie. 

 The first people encountered along the coast east of the Mac- 

 kenzie are the Kookpugmioots — they hunt the coast country 

 as far east as Liverpool Bay, but many of their best hunters 

 never saw a musk-ox. The Abdugmioots originally hunted 

 the Anderson River country, but now live around Liverpool 

 Bay, and most of them have hunted musk-ox. The Kogmo- 

 hks, who once lived around Liverpool and Franklin Bays, but 

 who are now practically merged with the Kookpugmioots, 

 along the shores of Allen Channel, have been musk-ox killers. 



A good many of the Port Clarence natives, living near 

 Bering Straits, have killed musk-oxen, but only around the 

 head of Franklin Bay and on Parry Peninsula, they having 

 been taken there by whalers. Nearly all the whaling ships 

 pick up Port Clarence natives, on their way north and east to 

 the whaling grounds, and keep them with them until their 

 return, perhaps thirty months later. Some of these vessels 

 have wintered at Cape Bathurst and in Langton Bay at the 

 head of Franklin Bay. Four of these vessels wintered in 

 Langton Bay in 1897-98, and during the winter their Eskimo 

 and sailors killed about eighty head of musk-oxen, most of 

 which were taken on the Parry Peninsula. When I was at 

 Herschel Island, in the winter of 1898, I saw forty of these 

 skins in one of the warehouses of the Pacific Steam Whaling 



