240 OUR ARCTIC PROVINCE. 



these involuntary sentinels of the night have often startled the 

 whole village by shouting at the top of their voices the pleasant 

 and electric announcement of the " ship's light ! " or they have 

 frozen it with superstitious horror at daybreak by then reciting 

 some ghostly vision that had appeared to them. 



The urchins play marbles, spin tops, and fly kites, intermittently, 

 with all the feverish energy displayed by such youth of our own sur- 

 roundings ; they frolic at base-ball, and use " shinny " sticks with 

 great volubility and activity. The girls are, however, much more 

 repressed, and, though they have a few games, and play quietly 

 with quaintly dressed dolls, yet they do not appear to be possessed 

 of that usual feminine animation so conspicuously marked in our 

 home-life. 



The attachment which the natives have for their respective islands 

 was well shown to me in 1874. Then a number of St. George peo- 

 ple were taken over to St. Paul, temporarily, to do the killing inci- 

 dental to a reduction of the quota of twenty -five thousand for their 

 island and a corresponding increase at St. Paul. They became 

 homesick immediately, and were never tired of informing the St. 

 Paul natives that St. George, was a far handsomer and more enjoy- 

 able island to live upon ; that walking over the long sand reaches 

 of " Pavel " made their legs grievously weary, and that the whole 

 effect of this change of residence was "ochen scootchnie." Natu- 

 rally the ire of the St. Paul people rose at once, and they retorted 

 in kind, indicating the rocky surface of St. George and its great in- 

 feriority as a seal-island. I was surprised at the genuine feeling on 

 both sides, because, as far as I could judge from a residence on 

 each island, it was a clear case of tweedle-dee and tweedle-dum be- 

 tween them as to opportunities and climate necessary for a pleas- 

 urable existence. The natives themselves are of one and common 

 stock, though the number of Creoles on St. George is relatively 

 much larger than on St. Paul. Consequently the tone of the St. 

 George village is rather more sprightly and vivacious. 



The question is naturally asked, How do these people employ 

 themselves during the long nine months of every year after the 

 close of the sealing season and until it begins again, when they 

 have little or absolutely nothing to do? It may be answered that 

 they simply vegetate, or, in other words, are entirely idle, mentally 

 and physically, during most of this period. But, to their credit, 

 let it be said that mischief does not employ their idle hands. They 



