412 THE POINT BARROW ESKIMO. 



account of ill treatment. One of these cases resulted in a permanent 

 separation, each of the couple finally marrying again, though the hus 

 band for a long time tried his best to get his wife to come back to him. 

 In another case, where the wife after receiving a beating ran away to 

 Nuwuk, and, as we were told, married another man, her first husband 

 followed her in a day or two and either by violence or persuasion made 

 her come back with him. They afterwards appeared to live together 

 011 perfectly good terms. 



On the other hand, we know of several cases where men discarded 

 wives who were unsatisfactory or made themselves disagreeable. For 

 instance, the younger Tunazu, when we first made his acquaintance, was 

 married to a widow very much his senior, who seemed to have a disa 

 greeable and querulous temper, so that we were not surprised to hear 

 in the spring of 1882 that they were separated and Tunazu married to 

 a young girl. His second matrimonial venture was no more successful 

 than his first, for his young wife proved to be a great talker. As he 

 told us : &quot; She talked all the time, so that he could not eat and could 

 not sleep.&quot; So he discarded her, and when we left the station he had 

 been for some time married to another old widow. 



In the case above mentioned, where the man with two wives discard 

 ed the younger of them, the reason he assigned was that she was lazy, 

 would not make her own clothes, and was disobedient to the older wife, 

 to whom he was much attached. As he said, Kakaguua (the older wife) 

 told her, &quot;Give me a drink of water,&quot; and she said, &quot;No!&quot; so Kaka- 

 guna said, &quot;Go!&quot; and she went. He did not show any particular con 

 cern about it. 



Dr. Simpson says, &quot;A great many changes take place before a per 

 manent choice is made;&quot; and again, &quot;A union once apparently settled 

 between parties grown up is rarely dissolved.&quot; 1 And this agrees with our 

 experience. The same appears to have been the case in Greenland. 

 Crantz 2 says, &quot;Such quarrels and separations only happen between 

 people in their younger years, who have married without due fore 

 thought. The older they grow, the more they love one another.&quot; 

 I Easy and unceremonious divorce appears to be the usual custom 

 I among Eskimo generally, and the divorced parties are always free to 

 t marry again/ 1 The only writer who mentions any ceremony of divorce 

 is Bessels, who witnessed such among the so-called &quot;Arctic Highland 

 ers&quot; of Smith Sound (Naturalist, vol. 18, pt. 9, p. 877). Dr. Simp- 



Op. oit., p. 253. 



Vol. 1, p. 100. 



3 &quot; They often repudiate and put away their wives, if either they do not suit their humors, or else if 

 they are harren, * * * and marry others.&quot; Egede, Greenland, p. 143. Compare also Crantz, vol. 1, 

 p. 160; Parry, Second Voyage, p. 528 (Fury and Heela Straits) ; Kumlien, Contributions, p. 17 (Cumber 

 land (iulf); and Hooper, Tents, etc., p. 100 &quot;repudiation is perfectly recognized, and in instances of 

 misconduct and sometimes of dislike, put in force &quot;without scruple or censure. * * * The rejected 

 wife * * does not generally wait long for another husband ;&quot; (Plover Bay.) Compare also Holm, 

 Geografisk Tidskrift. vol. 8, pp. 91-92, where he gives an account of marriage and divorce in east Green- 

 laud, remarkably like what we observed at Point liarrow. 



