BOAS.] DISTRIBUTION OF THE TRIBES. 425 



nait, i. e., the higher land as compared to the opposite shore, is 

 situated. 



Although at the present time this division is hardly justifiable, the 

 names of these four tribes are often mentioned on the shore of Davis 

 Strait. Their old settlements are still inhabited, biit their separate 

 tribal identity is gone, a fact wliirli is dui' as well in tlic diiuinutiou 

 in their numbers as to the iiitlumci' of the whaliTs \ isitinn tliem. 



In my oj^inion a great diftVi-fiu-t' hi'twccii tlicsc triln's m-vrr existed. 

 Undoubtedly they were groups of families confined to a certain 

 district and connected by a common life. Such a community could 

 more easily develop as long as tlio number of individuals was a large 

 one. When the whalers first wiulrivil in Cumberland Sound the 

 poiDulation may have amouuti'd tn ahuut 1,500. In 1840, when Penny 

 discovered the sound, he met -tu Eskimo in Anarnitung (Eenoolooapik, 

 p. 91). The greater number of the inhabitants were at the head of 

 the fjords fishing for salmon, others were whaling in Issortuqdjuaq, 

 and some were inland on a deer hunting expedition. The whole 

 number at that time probably amounted to 200. A few years later 

 the Kingnaitmiut of Qeqerten were able to man eighteen whaleboats. 

 Assuming five oarsmen and one harpooner to each boat, the steers- 

 man being furnished by the whalers, and for each man one wife and 

 two children, we have in all about 400 individuals. The inhabitants 

 of Nettilling Fjord may have numbered as many, and 100 are said to 

 have lived in Imigen. Penny found in Ugjuktung about 30 indi- 

 viduals who belonged to the Saumingmiut and had come thither 

 from Davis Strait. Accordingly I estimate the whole tribe at 150 in- 

 dividuals. On the southwestern coast of the sound between Nuvujen 

 and Naujateling a large number of natives were reported. They lived 

 in three settlements and numbercil about ono. Tlicse estimates are 

 not absolutely reliable, as tlicy anM-(iiiii)ili'(l lar,i;-rly frdin licarsay and 

 conjecture. Many of the nativus IjL'iug away in the summer, at the 

 time when these estimates were made, accuracy in their preparation 

 was impossible. From inquiries which were made among American 

 whalers who had visited this sound since 1851, the ]i()]iulatiijn of 

 Qeqerten must have been larger than that of any of the sctllciiicuts 

 contiguous to the sound. The estimation is the more dittii-ult as a 

 few settlements were sometimes deserted; for instance, Ukiadiiving, 

 in Saumia, and Qarmaqdjuin (Exeter Bay). Probably eight settle- 

 ments, with a population of 200 inhabitants each — i. e., 1,600 in the 

 sound —would be about the true number in 1840. At first I was in- 

 clined to believe in the existence of a larger number, but from later 

 reports I should consider this number too large rather than too small. 

 Since that time the population has diminished at a terrible rate. 

 In 1857 Warmow, a Moravian missionary who accompanied Penny, 

 estimated it at 300. If this was correct, the rapid diminution must 

 have occurred during the first years after the rediscovery of the 



