368 THE ESKIMO ABOUT BERING STRAIT ° [ETH. ANN. 18 
two ermine skins, the heads of the ermines being joined over the mid- 
dle of the forehead and the skins drawn back on each side, and hanging 
over the sides of the face, These were said to be totemic insignia. 
Third day 
About 4 oclock in the morning all the guests were aroused and ealled 
into the kashim, where a fur trader and myself, having come from 
the most remote country, were given the places of honor on the bench 
at the back of the room, to the left of the entrance. Next to us were 
the guests from Kuskokwim river, who came from the next farthest 
place, the guests being placed in precedence according to the distance 
from which they had come. The people were all seated in this way 
under the direction of the old headman of the village, who sits at the 
left of the drummers during the dances. 
When the guests were all seated the villagers came in and filled the 
vacant places. The seats of the guests thus allotted are reserved 
throughout the festival, and if a villager happens to be seated in one 
of them when the guest enters, he at once vacates it in favor of the 
original occupant; not to do so would be considered gross rudeness 
and would call forth a reprimand from the old men. 
The kashim at this place had two tiers of sleeping benches around its 
sides, and these were both fully occupied by the guests. The villagers 
gathered in a compact mass between the vacant space in the middle of 
the room and the wall, but leaving a passageway along the sides and 
back of the room, in which were ranged, at regular intervals, twelve 
clay lamps, supported on wooden posts or wicker-top holders about 30 
inches high. 
Each of these lamps was filled with seal oil and kept burning day 
and night during the festival. These lights are said to be made to 
burn constantly, so that the road back and forth from the land of the 
dead may be lighted and the shades to be honored may have no diffi- 
culty in coming to the feast. If one of the feast makers fails to put up 
a lamp in the kashim and keep it lighted, the shade he or she wishes 
to honor would be unable to find its way and would thus miss the feast. 
When the people, numbering about two hundred, were seated, an old 
man took a large drum, about 54 feet in diameter, and sat on a stool in 
the middle of the floor just in front of the customary lamp which burns 
at the back of the room. Then the headman of the village, who had 
attended to the seating of the guests, sat on a small stool at the right 
of the drummer, and on the left sat the headman’s brother on a similar 
stool. These acted as directors of the ceremonies and served also the 
purpose of prompting the drummer during the songs. The arrange- 
ment of the kashim was the same as on the first evening. 
The feast givers now filed in, each carrying a woven grass bag con- 
taining a fine suit of clothing worn during the dance of the preceding 
evening. At this time each was dressed in his or her poorest and old- 
est suit of clothing, tied about the waist by a cord of plaited grass. 
