380 THE ESKIMO ABOUT BERING STRAIT [ETH.ANN. 18 



First day 



The festival opens by the men giving the kashiin, including the fire- 

 pit, a thorough cleaning. After dark all the men, women, and children 

 in the village gather on the roof of the kashini and an old man beats a 

 drum while the people unite in a song addressed to the wild parsnip 

 (Archangdica], the stalks of which are standing uugathered on the 



distant hillsides. 



Second day 



On the second day four men go out and gather bundles of stalks of 

 the wild parsnip (i-M-t AJe) which they place on top of the entrance way 

 outside the kashim. When evening comes these bundles are taken 

 inside and laid on the floor, while the little boys of the village roll over 

 them and wrestle with one another on top of them ; then they are opened, 

 the stalks spread on the floor, and each man takes one in his hand and 

 sits at his place in the kashim uniting with the others in a song asking 

 the stalks to become dry; when the heat of the room dries the stalks 

 they are formed into a large sheaf. 



Third day 



At daybreak on this morning the sheaf is opened and from its con 

 tents a smaller sheaf is made about a foot in diameter, one end of 

 which is thrust down on a stake, four or five feet long, planted in the 

 floor, in front of the oil lamp which ordinarily burns at the rear of the 

 room. When it is daylight each hunter brings into the kashim the 

 inflated bladders of all the seals, whales, walrus, and white bears that 

 he has killed during the year. Each man ties the bladders in a bunch 

 by the necks and these bunches are hung up on seal spears stuck in the 

 wall in a row six or eight feet above the floor, at the back of the room. 

 Food is then brought into the kashim and offerings of small fragments 

 are thrown on the floor before the bladders; a libation of water is also 

 made in the same place; then the food is passed about and everyone 

 partakes of it. 



Fourth day 



On this morning every hunter takes down his bunch of bladders and 

 marks each with bands and dots of paint made from charcoal and oil; 

 the charcoal used for this purpose is made usually from wild parsnip 

 stalks. In the evening small torches are made from parsnip stalks, 

 which burn with a bright, flaring, resinous flame. Each of the young 

 men takes one of the torches and rushes about the room, leaping and 

 shrieking like a madman, waving the flaming torches about the blad 

 ders, so as to bathe them slightly in the fire and smoke, and then into 

 the faces of the men who are sitting about the room. When the place 

 becomes filled with thick smoke this performance ends by the torch 

 bearers jumping wildly about and shouting, while the young men and 

 boys catch one another and in succession each one is forced backward 

 down through the hole in the middle of the floor; everyone resists in a 

 good-natured way until he is overcome and forced through. 



