AN ARCTIC CHRISTMAS 129 



the small holes to remain frozen permanently but each 

 time you go out to tend the net you open the two end 

 holes and pull the net out of one of them. As you pull 

 the net out the rope part of your endless chain is pulled 

 into the water. When you have picked all the fish out 

 of the net, you pull on your rope and thus drag the net 

 back into the water. 



I am lucky in having hands that stand cold pretty 

 well, but when I came to help Kakotok pick fish out of 

 a net at forty below zero I found it the coldest job I had 

 ever tried. We dragged the whole net up on the ice and 

 the wriggling fish soon got themselves all covered with 

 snow. This turned into slush on their wet bodies. A 

 fish feels cold enough at best but these felt particularly 

 chilly. 



It does not make any difference if the net all freezes 

 into lumps while you are getting the fish out. Our net 

 got so balled up with snow and slush which turned into 

 ice that if it had remained in that condition it would have 

 caught no fish after being put back into the water. Ka- 

 kotok told me, however, that the water in the lake was 

 warm enough to melt the ice off the net, whereupon the 

 strain between the floats and the sinkers compelled the 

 net to take its proper vertical position in the water. 



Kakotok was setting three nets and he got from twenty 

 to fifty fish a day, ranging in weight from one to four 

 or five pounds. This was about as much as the men 

 and dogs of the household were eating, and when visitors 

 came the camp ran behind to the amount eaten by the 

 visiting men and dogs. This made evident the validity 

 of what Kakotok had told me, that they would either have 

 to abandon the camp entirely or else some of the family 

 would have to go off on a visit, taking away the dogs 



