AN ESKIMO WEDDING 



not seem particularly bashful ; the young man 

 grinned rather sheepishly as he came in, but the 

 girl was quite at her ease from start to finish, and 

 the two of them sat on their stools very solemn 

 and sedate. We started with a hymn and prayer ; 

 then came a sermon of fifteen or twenty minutes 

 duration, pointedly addressed to the parties on the 

 stools; after that the actual wedding ceremony. 

 It was simplicity itself; no ring, no best man, no 

 bridesmaids, no giving away. The missionary stood 

 in front of the couple, and asked them the usual 

 questions; then he joined their hands and pro- 

 claimed them man and wife. 



After a short prayer and a hymn they adjourned 

 to the vestry to sign the register, accompanied by 

 two grave-faced elders who were to act as witnesses. 

 That register is a curiosity ; page after page of 

 Eskimo names in sprawling handwriting, with here 

 and there, at long intervals, a couple of European 

 names to signalise the marriage of one of the mission- 

 aries. This serious and weighty matter of signing 

 the register took quite a time, and the village had 

 got back into the swing of work before the newly- 

 married couple came out. I watched them from my 

 window. The young man plodded stolidly ahead, 

 stuffing tobacco into his pipe as he went, and the 

 bride did her best to keep up with him. She lifted 

 her skirt to hurry ; she planted her feet in the deep 

 pits her lord and master was making as he trudged 

 through the soft snow; she did her best, but she 

 lagged. 



He never turned his head. It did not seem to 

 strike him to offer her his arm ; the custom of the 



people was for the bride to follow, and she followed. 



78 



