NORTH AMERICA AND THE WEST INDIES 307 



dependence of the Eskimo of the Etah and Smith Sound area. 

 Macmillan (1918), in his account of experiences here, tells of 

 the Eskimo setting forth on their annual hunt for the caribou, 

 about 50 miles north of Etah, on September 10, 1914, and 

 returning on the 23rd with "forty -two warm skins, invaluable 

 for bed-robes, coats, and sleeping-bags for the extreme tem- 

 peratures to come." At another time the Eskimos reported 

 killing 19 in two weeks. In February, 1916, Macmillan 

 noticed the wandering of the caribou herd southward to the 

 vicinity of Etah, because of deep snows covering their feeding 

 grounds between there and Humboldt Glacier, which forms a 

 natural barrier to the northward extension of their range. Of 

 six killed near Etah, the heaviest weighed but 120 pounds. 

 It is believed that this northern herd is much preyed upon by 

 wolves, for in 1916, Macmillan writes, the Eskimos returning 

 late in October from the annual caribou hunt throughout the 

 region extending from Etah to Humboldt Glacier, reported "no 

 young caribou whatever and tracks of wolves everywhere." 

 It was his belief that the wolves had crossed over Smith Sound 

 on the ice from Ellesmere Land and had accounted for the 

 young caribou. The Eskimo ^stated that they had seen a 

 number of caribou sleeping on the ice in the center of lakes, 

 probably for security against attacks by wolves. 



Returning to the southern tip of Greenland, Jensen notes 

 that these caribou were in former times found at Angmags- 

 salik but are exterminated. During recent decades they have 

 also disappeared from the coast between Cape Dalton and 

 Cape Brewster. In the northern part of East Greenland the 

 Ryder expedition in 1891-92 "encountered reindeer with com- 

 parative frequency in the region round Scoresby Sound; in 

 1899 Nathorst only saw a few herds." The "Danmark Ex- 

 pedition" in 1906-8 found "innumerable traces (cast-off 

 antlers and excrements) of the former occurrence of reindeer 

 in great numbers, as far north as Holm Land (lat. 80 20' N.), 

 but now they have entirely disappeared"; this disappearance 

 from the northeast coast is corroborated by later reports of 

 explorers and hunters. Coincident with this disappearance 

 may have been the abandonment of the region by the Eskimo, 

 whose deserted camps have been investigated in the same 

 region. Nathorst, who in 1899 saw only a few herds in the 

 Scoresby Sound region, attributed this disappearance to wolves, 



