AN ARCTIC CHRISTMAS 127 



the midwinter is the chief worry of the Eskimos in those 

 seasons when food is scarce. Kakotok said that their 

 shortage of food was due to late arrival at the Eskimo 

 Lakes in the fall. Had they come two or three weeks 

 earlier, he considered that they would have had no trouble 

 in getting all the food that they could possibly have 

 needed for the winter. 



Ilavinirk and Kakotok agreed, and my whole observa- 

 tion since has confirmed it, that to make a living in the 

 Mackenzie district you should follow the well-known prin- 

 ciple of making hay while the sun shines — which here 

 means fishing in the fishing season. But throughout the 

 preceding winter they had been accumulating fox skins 

 and other things which they wanted to sell during the 

 summer. The cargoes of trade goods from Edmonton 

 ordinarily arrive at Macpherson early in July, and the 

 traders that come in through Bering Straits arrive at 

 Herschel Island late in July or sometime in August. In 

 some places, such as Shingle Point, you cannot fish very 

 well until the nights turn dark. But there are many other 

 places where the water is muddy and the fishing good 

 even during the summer of perpetual daylight. That is 

 the logical harvest season, but the Eskimos are then off on 

 their trading journeys to Fort Macpherson or Herschel 

 Island. Many of them want to visit both places. If 

 the season happens to be late, as it was my first summer 

 there, the Eskimos hang around Herschel Island until 

 the end of August. Harrison and I had hung around 

 there with them, and so we did not leave for the fishing 

 grounds until it was too late for either the Eskimos or 

 Harrison to lay up a suitable supply. 



I used to go with Kakotok to see how he fished. There 

 were two methods in use on the Eskimo Lakes. One 



