MURDOCH.] TRIUAL PHENOMENA. 43 



&quot;limit&quot; of other dialects, and meaning people,&quot; or &quot;human beings.&quot; 

 Under this name they include white men and Indians as well as Eskimo, 

 as is the case in Greenland and the Mackenzie River district, and prob 

 ably also everywhere else, though many writers have supposed it to be 

 applied by them only to their own race. 



They have however special names for the former two races. The 

 people of any village are known as &quot;the inhabitants of such and such 

 a place;&quot; for instance, Nuwu fimiim, &quot;the inhabitants of the point;&quot; 

 Utkiavwlnmiun, &quot;the inhabittints of Utkiavwln;&quot; Kuiiiniu.ii (in Green- 

 landic &quot; Kungmiut&quot;), &quot;the people who live on the river.&quot; The people 

 about Norton Sound speak of the northern Eskimo, especially those of 

 Point Harrow and Gape Smyth, as &quot; Kufimu dllfi,&quot; which is not a name 

 derived from a location, but a sort of nickname, the meaning of which 

 was not ascertained. The Point Barrow natives do not call themselves 

 by this name, but apply it to those people whose winter village is at 

 Demarcation Point (or Herschel Island, see above, p. 20). This word 

 appears in the corrupted form &quot; Kokmullit,&quot; as the name of the village 

 at Xuwiik on Petrolf s map. Petroff derived his information regarding 

 the northern coast at second-hand from people who had obtained their 

 knowledge of names, etc., from the natives of Norton Sound. 



The people of the two villages under consideration frequently go back 

 ward and forward, sometimes removing permanently from one village to 

 the other, while strangers from distant villages sometimes winter here, 

 so that it was not until the end of the second year, when we were inti 

 mately acquainted with everybody at Utkiavwln, that we could form 

 anything like a correct estimate of the population of this village. 1 

 This we found to be about 140 souls. As well as we could judge, there 

 were about 150 or 100 at Nuwtik. These figures show a great decrease 

 in numbers since the end of 1853, when Dr. Simpson 2 reckoned the pop 

 ulation of Nuwiik at 309. During the 2 years from September, 1881, to 

 August, 1883, there were fifteen deaths that we, heard of in the village 

 of Utkiavwln alone, and only two children born in that period survived. 

 With this ratio between the number of births and deaths, even in a 

 period of comparative plenty, it is difficult to see how the race can es 

 cape speedy extinction, unless by accessions from without, which in their 

 isolated situation they are not likely to receive. 3 



SOCIAL SURROUNDINGS. 

 CONTACT WITH UNCIVILIZED I EOPLK. 



Other Eskimo. The nearest neighbors of these people, as has been 

 stated above, are the Eskimo living at Demarcation Point (or Herschel 



See &quot;Approximate Census, etc..&quot; Report of Point Harrow Exp., p. 49. 



0p. cit., p. 2:)7. 



*Petrou&quot; s estimate (Report, etc., p. 4) of the number of natives on this part of the Aretie coast is 

 much too large. He gives the population of &quot;Ootiwakh&quot; (I tkiavwln) as 25. Refuge Inlet (where 

 there is merely a summer camp of Ctkiavwifnniun), 40, and &quot; Kokmnllit,&quot; 200. The supposed settle 

 ment of 50 inhabitants at the Colville River is also a mere summer camp, not existing in the winter. 



