136 MV ARCTIC JOURNAL 



if she finds that she has made a mistake. " Misfortune " had 

 grown very fond of the " kabloonah's kapah " (white man's 

 food), especially coffee and crackers, during his visit at Red- 

 cliffe, and he now came right to our sledge and asked if we 

 had no "kapah " for him. He told us that he, with his wife, 

 and Tawanah with his w'ife, a son twelve years of age, and 

 three smaller children, were on their way to Redcliffe. They 

 had left their home, Nunatochsoah, at the head of Inglefield 

 Gulf, two days before, and had walked all day and until mid- 

 night, when they built the snow-house and camped. The 

 women and children being very tired, and seal-holes, whence 

 young seals are procured, being plentiful in this neighborhood, 

 they decided to rest a few days and hunt seal. I asked him 

 where they found the pretty little white creatures, and he told 

 me that the mother seal crawls out on the ice through the 

 cracks and hollows out a place for herself under the snow, not 

 disturbing the surface at all, except perhaps by raising it a 

 little, and thus giving it the appearance of a snow-drift or 

 mound. Here she gives birth to her young, and stays with 

 them until they are old enough to take to the water, leaving 

 them only long enough to get food for herself. 



To me these mounds did not seem different in appearance 

 from the ordinary snow-mound, but the trained eye of the 

 native immediately distinguishes the "pussy igloo" (seal- 

 house) ; he walks softly up to it, and puts his ear close to the 

 snow and listens. If he hears any sign of life he jumps on the 

 mound as hard as he can, until it caves in, and then, with a 



