108 



THE LAST CRUISE OF THE MIEAJiTDA. 



Most of our party Avent over to pay their final respects to the 

 kind governors and their ladies^ for it was arranged that Ave 

 should start on the folloAving morning. As I came out of 

 the governors^ house I found an Eskimo dance in progress 

 on a little square near the house. Two or three Eskimo girls 

 at once seized me and laughingly pulled me into the dance — a 

 very lively and energetic one — and so I jigged away for an 



y 



wi 



COMING TO SAY GOOD-BYE. 



hour or more, to my own amusement and that of the Eskimos. 

 And how they do dance, tliese little people ! With their whole 

 bodies and with their whole souls. An Eskimo dance is a 

 scene of life, of rapid movement, of intense enjoyment. No 

 sad funereal faces, or bodies somberly clad in black, as if in deep 

 mourning for their folly or their sins, and moving dejected- 

 ly and regretfully, among the jovial Eskimo men. And the 



