Told of the Red Indian Whalers 37 



the form of a beautiful young woman sitting 

 beside a lamp that burned as long as the whale 

 lived. They saw the cunning of the raven, the 

 simplicity of the seal, and they laughed heartily 

 at the thought of a raven taking a whale from 

 them by guile. They could while away the long 

 hours of a winter's storm by elaborating a story 

 to explain a strange companionship that they had 

 observed among the tundras. 



Not less interesting were the mental charac- 

 teristics of the whalers found on the other coasts 

 of America. If we could but see their courage 

 and fortitude, and their humor and poetry, they 

 might seem now to be something different from 

 the vile and degraded heathen they were sup- 

 posed to be when the white men first came among 

 them. 



