372 THE ESKIMO ABOUT BERING STRAIT [eth.ann. 18 



everyone broke his fast. After the food was disposed of, songs of invi- 

 tation were sung to tlie dead and a dance was performed exactly like 

 that of the previous day. When this was ended, the feast givers 

 brought in about a ton of fine dried salmon, and each sat down behind 

 his or her pile. Then a man came in and the same style of word play 

 was engaged in as on the day before, after which the feast givers dis- 

 tributed their salmon, the trader and myself getting about 200 pounds 

 each. This was followed by an interval of about an hour, when the 

 dance was repeated. Following this more salmon and a quantity 

 of cranberries were distributed; then another interval ensued, lasting 

 until just before dark, and the dance given in the morning was again 

 repeated, but with a different ending. 



As the dance concluded the central drummer, an old man, arose, and, 

 holding the drum and stick overhead, called out, " Turn now as light (of 

 day) goes," and, with a loud, hissing noise, he turned slowly a quarter of 

 a circle with the sun, from left to right, and stopped; after a short pause 

 he turned another quarter of a circle and stopped again, and so on 

 until the circle was completed. At the same time all the dancers turned, 

 stopped, and started again with the drummer, making the same hissing 

 noise; when the circle was completed the dancers stamped their feet 

 and slapped their thighs to make themselves clean, and all went out 

 side. About half of the dancers then stood in front of the kashim and 

 began to dance, while most of the others went among the graves, which 

 were just behind the building, and danced before the grave boxes of 

 those in whose honor the feast was given. At the same time four men 

 who had lost relatives by drowning went to the ice of the Yukon, 

 where they danced. The old drummer stood on the top of the kashim 

 beating his drum for those dancing before the door; the dancers among 

 the graves had time beaten for them by an old man striking the end of 

 a log projecting from the wall of a house near by, and those who went 

 to the river danced to time beaten on a piece of wood carried by one of 

 the old men. 



The reason given for the dance by the graves was that the shades of 

 the dead were believed to have returned from their place of abode in 

 the other world in response to the invitations and to be occupying their 

 grave boxes when not in the kashim, and by the dance the shades were 

 shown that their relatives were taking part in the festival. At the 

 close of this dance the children of the village, to the number of seventy 

 or eighty, gathered in the kashim, occupying the center of the room in 

 a square body, each child having a small wooden dish and a grass bag 

 in its hands, and shouting in deafening chorus, " Wi-hlu!^^ (me, too) 



The women had come in, meanwhile, bringing bags of berries, which 

 they put by handfuls into the dishes of the children, who immediately 

 emptied the dishes into the bags and held them out again, crying for 



