ON HERSCHEL AND FLAXMAN ISLANDS 313 



driven off the deer, while their desire for white [man's food 

 makes them flock to Herschel Island, at least during the two 

 summer months, to trade their furs for flour, sugar, and tobacco. 

 The great storehouses are empty, the club-house has long ago 



ESKIMO CAMP ON HERSCHEL ISLAND. 



ceased to exist as a club-house and is now a barrack for the 

 Mounted Police, and soon the ships will cease to come at all. 



These people, as a matter of fact, are far worse off than those 

 at Point Barrow, where whalers and other vessels will continue 

 to come, and where beach whalers are living, so that the natives 

 can always procure our food. At Herschel Island, on the 

 contrary, they will soon be reduced to their native food and be 

 forced to return to their old savage life. 



But, what is still worse, the native tribes are dying out in a 

 most alarming way. Where early explorers found large settle- 

 ments of hundreds of people there are now only a few ruins left ; 

 and where at one time the native tribes flourished as the lords 

 of the country, looking in wonder and distrust upon the small 

 parties of explorers which now and then came their way, there 

 are now only the miserable remnants of a once powerful tribe, 

 who are practically owned by the whalers, enslaved by the 

 desires which these, their masters, have themselves introduced 

 among them. 



A few days after my arrival at Herschel Island I heard that 

 a report to the effect that we were lost on the ice had been 

 carried back to civilization. It was the tale which Uxra had 

 told Mr. Stefansson and " Cape York," and which the latter 

 had brought down to Herschel Island. The report had been 

 considerably changed in course of time and was, in its latest 



