116 On the trail of vanishing birds 



attempting to sing the well known air from The Mikado, for they 

 would shout, in their high-pitched voices, "Tea-too-wit! Tea-too- 

 wit!" Or, "Tea-too-wichy!," as it sounded on occasion. We soon 

 learned that 'Tea-too-wichy!" means 'Tea is ready!" To sit 

 around and drink tea and talk a favorite pastime of these simple 

 people is to engage in a "Tea-too-wit." Even the stout old 

 party without a shirt sang out a cheerful "Tea-too-wichy!" at us, 

 but her skin tent had such a high odor, even from twenty feet 

 away, that we declined, as politely as possible. 



We also learned the way in which these Eskimos have econo- 

 mized their language with regard to such frequently used and 

 important words as yes and no. For "yes" they open the eyes very 

 wide, raise the eyebrows and wrinkle the nose. For "no" they 

 utter a sharp, nasal "i-h!" or "i-ih!," slurred slightly but actually 

 only one syllable. Very effective. 



On the twenty-eighth, in spite of a light rain and overcast, 

 we loaded our gear aboard and prepared to take off on our return 

 flight. To all intents and purposes our summer's work was com- 

 pleted, although we still wanted to have a look at some possible 

 whooping-crane territory between Great Bear and Great Slave 

 Lakes. We gave Canon Webster a flight plan that he said he 

 would try and have radioed on ahead (it never got through!) 

 and took off at three o'clock for Eldorado and Yellowknife. 



One hour later, as we were approaching McTavish Arm, the 

 rain increased, with strong gusts of wind from the southeast. 

 Visibility grew rapidly worse. In another few minutes we were 

 completely blanked out no vision at all. The mist and rain 

 swirled around us and we hurtled along, blind as bats and far 

 worse off, because we had no sonar such as bats are equipped 

 with. Suddenly, as we were beginning to sweat with apprehension, 

 a hole in the mist opened up quite unaccountably and there 

 below us lay an open bay. We had a momentary view of a wooded 

 shoreline and saw in a flash a few figures that were unmistakably 

 Indians standing on a high bank in front of some rude tents. Then 

 we were skimming along close to the water, which was as rough 

 as the open sea, watching for a chance to put down. In a little 

 bay, behind the protection of a small island, we had our chance. 



