WHEN THE ESKIMOS LEFT US 253 



and together we walked out to meet our visitor, who 

 proved to be Sipsu. It was very cold the highest 

 temperature registered during the day being forty 

 degrees below zero and the poor fellow had his face 

 badly frozen. He had brought me four hares and 

 a large walrus liver and heart. We took him to the 

 shack at once and I prepared for him a good meal of 

 corn mush, tea, and biscuits. 



Sipsu was one of the best men in the tribe but of 

 a very excitable disposition, and when we met him 

 he was so excited and talked so rapidly I could at 

 first understand but little of what he said, but at 

 length comprehended that old Oxpuddyshou would 

 be in Annootok very shortly, prepared to go with me 

 to Ellesmere Land for musk-ox. This was very good 

 news. 



Sipsu reported a great many walrus off Nockme 

 but said that the ice was very bad and hunting dan- 

 gerous. He and Kulutinguah had killed four a few 

 days earlier, but before they could get them to land 

 the ice went abroad and the walrus were lost. Sipsu 

 was to remain with us two days. This, according to 

 my reckoning, of which I was by no means certain, 

 was March twenty-second. 



Late the next evening Oxpuddyshou arrived. He, 

 too, had a badly frozen face. He said he should 

 have reached us the previous night but the head wind 

 was so strong he was compelled to stop half way up 

 from Etah and build a snow igloo for shelter. He 

 brought us three hares, one walrus liver, and best of 

 all, two sacks of coal. Walrus liver is very good, 



