CLOTHING AND CLEANLINESS 



huts, the people look dirty. The huts are small, and 

 all the work of skinning and dressing the seals must 

 be done in them because out-of-doors everything 

 freezes as hard as stone ; and so the work-a-day 

 clothes are black and shiny with oil. But by every 

 bedside there stands a box, and in that box is a clean 

 outfit for Sunday use. I can imagine that that was 

 the beginning of the lesson in the hands of those old 

 missionaries : " Come to the House of God neat and 

 clean " ; and if any proof were needed of the truth 

 of my idea, it could be found in the person of a man 

 who died at Nain some three or four years ago. The 

 poor fellow was deaf and dumb from birth, and had 

 learnt to talk in signs; and his way of saying 

 " Sunday " was to rub his hands over his face " The 

 day on which he washed his face " ! 



I found the people using soap and water fairly 

 often, and taking a good deal of pride in their appear- 1 

 ance ; in fact, the women and girls are very fastidious! 

 indeed about their hair, and wash and comb it with 

 real feminine pride. As for the washing of clothes, | 

 that they do in their own way. They wet them and 

 soap them, and then drop them into the brook and! 

 trample on them ; and there they used to stand, in 

 a pool in the brook just outside my window, tramp- 

 ling in the shallow water, singing and talking to pass 

 the time, and, alas, puffing at their pipes. 



It seems strange that the Eskimos should bd 

 addicted to so essentially an Indian habit as smoking 

 How did they learn it, and when? Was it the! 

 " pipe of peace," after one of their old quarrels, that 

 started the craving ? Or did they first get it fronj 

 passing vessels? Perhaps so; but who can tell . 



Eskimos and Indians are hereditary foes : even in m] 



110 



