1901.] Allen, Musk-Oxen of Arctic America and Greenland. 85 



the eastward on one of the whaling ships. The Tooyogmioots, a tribe of Es- 

 kimo who once lived along this coast and hunted these different mountains, 

 are now almost extinct. I found between the mouth of the Mackenzie and 

 Herschel Island a very few individuals living in snow houses, but I did not find 

 in or around their places of residence any sign of Musk-Ox skins, bones, or 

 heads. 



I remained at Herschel Island from Nov. 24 to Dec. 14, visiting the Rev. 

 I. O. 'Stringer and Capt. Haggerty of the steam-whaler ' Mary Dehume.' Both 

 men were able to converse readily with the Eskimo in the Eskimo tongue, 

 and they gave me every possible assistance in making my inquiries. This 

 whole coast far to the westward of Herschel Island is now occupied by the 

 Noonitagmioot tribe of Eskimo. There were a large number of these people 

 at the island, and among them were parties who hunted all the mountains of 

 the mainland mentioned, living in the mountains a great part of the time. 

 Many skins of Caribou, Sheep, and fur-bearing animals were seen in the posses- 

 sion of these people, but none of them possessed any part of the Musk-Ox, and 

 the only members of the tribe who knew anything of the Musk-Ox were those 

 who had been carried to the east by whaling ships. The Rev. Mr. Stringer 

 takes great interest in the natural resources of the country and travels exten- 

 sively among these people, but he had no knowledge of the existence of any 

 Mnsk-Oxen west of the Mackenzie. Capt. Haggerty had wintered along this 

 coast for a number of years, trading extensively with the natives, but he had 

 never secured or heard of a Musk-Ox skin west of the Mackenzie. 



All the whaling ships, which have wintered here for years, sometimes as 

 many as fifteen at the same time, keep Eskimo hunters in the field continually 

 for the purpose of securing fresh meat for the crews, sending white sailors in 

 charge of dog sleds to visit the Eskimo camps to bring in the meat It is not 

 uncommon for these sleds to go one hundred and fifty to two hundred miles for 

 meat, and all the mountains to the north and west of Herschel Island have 

 been visited many times by these hunters and sledding parties, without obtaining 

 any trace of Musk-Ox. Collinson, who wintered near Camden Bay in 1853- 

 54, does not mention the Musk-Ox. The U. S. Government Survey party, 

 which wintered on the Porcupine several years ago and visited Rampart 

 House, a Hudson Bay trading post at the Ramparts on the Porcupine River, and 

 who went from there with Mr. John Firth, the Hudson Bay Company's trader, 

 north through these mountains to the Arctic Coast and returned, did not find 

 Musk-Ox. Several white men have travelled back and forth through these 

 mountains from Fort Yukon, on the Yukon River, to Herschel Island, for the 

 purpose of securing sled dogs of the Eskimo on the Arctic Coast, to be used on 

 the Yukon, without securing or learning anything of the Musk-Ox. Mr. 

 Hodgson and Mr. Firth, both in the service of the Hudson Bay Company, have 

 been stationed at Fort Yukon at the mouth of the Porcupine, at Rampart 

 House on the Porcupine, and at Lapierres House on Bell River, a tributary of 

 the Porcupine, during a period of over thirty years, trading with the Loucheaux 

 Indians, several tribes of which hunt north of these places into the mountains 

 mentioned, without ever obtaining any knowledge of the existence of Musk- 



