550 PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. [aNNO 1774. 



bear a very near resemblance to the Laplanders, both in their persons and 

 customs. They have beards, so have the Greenlanders, and indeed so have the 

 inhabitants of Lapland; whereas the Iroquois, the Hurons, the Escopics, and 

 the Mountaineers their neighbours, have hair no where except on the head. 

 These Indians, in general, are not very disagreeably featured, though some 

 among them are extremely ugly. They are flat-visaged, and have short noses. 

 Their hair is black and extremely coarse. Their hands and feet are remarkably 

 small. The women load their heads with large strings of beads, which they 

 fasten to the hair above the ears ; and they are fond of a hoop of bright brass, 

 which they wear as a coronet. Their dress is entirely of skins, except those 

 who have trafficked for a little blanketing. It consists of a sort of hooded close 

 shirt, breeches, stockings, and boots. They wear the hairy side towards them, 

 according to the seasons ; and between the dress of the different sexes there is 

 no variety, except that the women wear monstrous large boots, and their upper 

 garment is ornamented with a tail. In the boots they occasionally place their 

 children ; but the youngest is always carried at their back, in the hood of their 

 jacket. They have no sort of bread ; but live chiefly on the flesh of seal, deer, 

 fish, and birds. Till very lately they ate every thing raw, and putrefaction was 

 deemed no objection. 



In the winter they live in houses, or rather caverns, for they are sunk in the 

 earth. In the summer they dwell in tents, which are made circular with poles, 

 and covered with skins sewed together. The house consists of one room, and 

 though not very large, yet it contains several brothers or other relations, with 

 their wives and children. Their tents are still more crowded ; because, as the 

 whole summer they are generally rambling up and down the coast, they endeavour 

 to diminish their baggage as much as possible. They are without any govern- 

 ment ; and no man is superior to another, but as he excels in strength or in 

 courage, and in having the greatest number of wives and children. Being 

 entirely without laws, general censure is the only punishment for the most de- 

 testable crimes. They have no marriage ceremony. A wife is considered as 

 property, and a husband lends one of his wives to a friend. The wives are given 

 very early in marriage, frequently several years before consummation ; and the 

 reason of this is, because the girl's father, by that means, has one less in family 

 to {jrovide for. 



The Esquimeaux men are extremely indolent ; and the women are the greatest 

 drudges upon the face of the earth. They do every thing except procure food, 

 and even in that they are frequently assistants ; so that they are at continual 

 labour. They sew with the sinews of deer, and their needle-work is amazingly 

 neat. Their language is the same as the Greenlanders. It is not altogether 

 devoid of harmony, and the women have very delicate voices. These Indians 



