ETHNOLOGY. 



i. 



PAPERS ON THE GREENLAND ESKIMOS. 



BY 



CLEMENTS R. MARK 1 1 AM. 



1. 



On the Origin and Migrations of the Greenland Eskimos. 



An expedition to the region round the North Pole will advance 

 every branch of science, and will enrich the store of human 

 knowledge generally. Its geographical discoveries will only be one 

 out of the many valuable results that will be derived from it ; but, 

 as geographers, we may well look forward with deep interest to the 

 rich harvest that will be reaped by our science, and take a prelimi- 

 nary survey of the additional knowledge that may be in store for us. 

 it should be remembered that, though only one-half of the Arctic 

 regions has been explored, yet that throughout its most desert wastes 

 there are found abundant traces of former inhabitants where now 

 all is a silent solitude. Those cheerless wilds have- noi been inha- 

 bited for centuries, yet they are covered with traces of the wanderers 

 or sojourners of a by-gone age ; and the unexplored region far to the 

 north, even up to the very Pole itself, may not improbably be at 

 this moment, supporting a small and scattered population. The 

 wanderings of these mysterious people, the scanty notices of theii 

 origin ami migrations that are scattered through history, and the 

 requirements of th< ir existence, are all so many clues which, when 

 carefully gathered together, will assuredly tend to throw some 

 Light on a most interesting subject. The migrations of man within 

 the Arctic zone give rise to questions which are closely connected 

 with the geography of the undiscovered portions of the Arctic 

 regions — questions which can only be solved by a scientific Arctic, es 

 pedition, The origin and history of the Eski of Greenland, and 



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