148 



Eskimo came in contact, appears to me to be the correct and 

 obvious one. Judging from the scanty descriptions of their 

 culture, they were not very different from old tribes in Hudson 

 bay and Alaska. Old stone houses with whalebone ribs for 

 roofs are described by Boas (pages 548, 549) as still existing, in 

 a more or less ruinous state, among the Central Eskimo, by 

 Nelson, among the Alaskan Eskimo (pages 259, 260), and by 

 Bogoras among the Asiatic Eskimo (pages 181, 182). Their 

 stone weapons could be paralleled in archaeological collections 

 from different Eskimo tribes. The fact that they had forgotten 

 or did not understand the construction of the kayak should not 

 count against them as an Eskimo tribe, because a like fact is 

 recorded by Rasmussen (page 32) of the Polar Eskimo, who 

 had also forgotten the use of the bow and arrow, as is recorded 

 of the Tunnit, until its use was reintroduced by immigrant 

 Eskimo from the south. That the Tunnit did not understand 

 the dressing of skins is the main difficulty, but this should not 

 be taken too literally, as in all their stories about them, the 

 Eskimo like to exaggerate the stupidity of the Tunnit and their 

 own cleverness in overcoming them. 



THE LAST OF THE TUNNIT. 



A big, overgrown giant, the last of the Tunnit left on the 

 Labrador coast, lived a long time ago near Hebron. He would not 

 hunt nor do any work. Whenever he wanted food he took it 

 away from the hunters. He would watch when they brought in 

 their seals at the end of the day's hunt, and go up to them and 

 take his choice. They were all afraid of him on account of his 

 size and strength and did not dare resist him. 



Finally a hard winter came when the hunters could get no 

 seal. Then he had to starve with the rest of them. When they 

 were nearly dead with hunger, the people decided to send out 

 six of their best hunters to see if they could not get some food. 

 They were all surprised when the giant asked to go along too. 

 Then they saw a chance to get rid of him. So they asked him 

 to promise to obey all the customs of the hunters, which he did 

 readily enough, suspecting nothing. 



