30 JOURNAL OF RELIGIOUS PSYCHOLOGY 



As an example of their disposition we may cite their behavior 

 in the communal houses, such as those of East Greenland. In 

 one such house, Holm found thirty-eight persons, of eight differ 

 ent families. This room, be it remembered, was the only refuge 

 of all these people during the long darkness of the Arctic winter, 

 here they did their sleeping, cooking, eating, working, dancing 

 and merrymaking. 



And yet, we are assured, no quarrel disturbs the peace, there is 

 no dispute about the use of the narrow space. Scolding or even unkind 

 words are considered a misdemeanor when not produced under the legal 

 form of process, viz., the nith-song.&quot; (52: 26; 30: 74; 20: 150.) 



Crantz declares 



There is less noise and confusion in a Greenland house inhabited by 

 ten couples with numerous children of different ages, than in a single 

 European one, where only two relations reside with their families. ( 16. 1 : 

 156.) 



Nansen writes, 



&quot;The Greenlander is of all God s creatures gifted with the best dis 

 position. Good humor, peaceableness, and evenness of temper are the most 

 prominent features in his character. He is eager to stand on as good 

 a footing as possible with his fellow-men, and therefore refrains from 

 offending them and much more from using coarse terms of abuse. He 

 is very loth to contradict another even should he be saying what he 

 knows to be false; if he does so, he takes care to word his remonstrance 

 in the mildest possible form, and it would be very hard indeed for 

 him to say right out that the other was lying. He is chary of telling 

 other people truths which he thinks will be unpleasant to them; in such 

 cases he chooses the vaguest expressions, even with reference to such 

 indifferent things as, for example, wind and weather. His peaceableness 

 even goes so far that w r hen anything is stolen from him, which seldom 

 happens, he does not as a rule reclaim it even if he knows who has taken 

 it.&quot; (43: 101; cf. 30: 182; 4: 372, 385; 21: 385; 66: 180.) 



So, too, Crantz says that &quot;they are patient of injuries, and will 

 concede their manifest rights rather than engage in dispute. * 

 (16. 1:126.) &quot;No one interrupts another in the course of a 

 conversation, nor do they willingly contradict each other, much 

 less give way to clamorous brawling.&quot; (16. 1: 157.) 

 Of the Eskimo at Point Barrow, Murdoch states : 



&quot;They are generally peacable. We did not witness a single quarrel 

 among the men during the two years of our stay.&quot; He had reports of 

 fights, due to white men s liquor. &quot;Many of them show a grace of 

 manner and natural delicacy and politeness which is quite surprising. I 



