284 HUNTING WITH THE ESKIMOS 



would touch the cache, let it be said, as anxious as 

 they were to investigate its contents, without my con- 

 sent to do so. Finally when everything was in or- 

 der I gave the word, and the Eskimos rushed at it 

 like crazy men. 



It did not take them long to remove the rocks and 

 tear the boxes open. There were four large tin boxes, 

 containing one box of fine tea, one box of coffee, one 

 box of sugar, five cans of cranberry sauce, twenty- 

 four boxes of matches, a number of cakes of choco- 

 late, two boxes of films for a small camera, six rolls of 

 films which I found would fit my own camera and 

 which I appropriated, one plane, one small knife, 

 some .22 cartridges, which had gone bad, some rifle 

 cartridges which were as good as ever, one large and 

 one small fry pan, one large box of dried walrus and 

 narwhal meat, and dog pemmican, customarily made 

 by white men in the Arctic but to the great disap- 

 pointment of all, no tobacco. 



Though the pemmican was intended for dogs, the 

 Eskimos seemed to enjoy it immensely. Everything 

 was carried down to camp, and there, in accordance 

 with Dr. Cook's request, I divided between his two 

 men, Etukishuk and Ahwelah, such things as I did 

 not need myself. 



Here in our camp near the cache we halted for 

 seven hours. I slept poorly, weary as I was, and put 

 in a miserable night, owing to the constant cracking 

 of the ice, with loud reports, sometimes directly be- 

 neath us, when it would tremble and threaten to 

 swallow us up. The Eskimos were all sleeping 



