250 



THE HUDSON BAY ESKIMO. 



long. The. game is that the person hohling the plaything shall, by a 

 dextrous swing of the ball, catch it upon the ivory peg held in the hand. 

 The person engages to catch it a certain number of times iu succession, 



and on failure to 

 do so allows the 

 opponent to try her 

 skill. The skull of 

 a hare is often sub- 

 stituted for the 

 ivory "ball," and a 

 few jierforations 

 are made in the 

 walls of the skull 



Fig. 75.— Cup and ball. Koksoagin.vut. tO receive the peg. 



It requires a great amount of practice to catch the ball, as the string is 

 so short that one must be quick to thrust the peg in before it describes 

 the part of a small circle. 



The children sometimes use a stick or other sharp-pointed instrument 

 to make a series of straight lines in the newly fallen snow and at the 

 same time repeat certain gibberish. This was at first very confusing 

 to me, but a woman repeated the words 

 and I guessed from her description 

 where the idea sprang from. 



These people had heard of the teach- 

 ings of the Labrador missionaries (Mo- 

 ravians), all of whom are Germans, 

 and as the Eskimo of that coast use 

 the German numerals in preference to 

 their own, the natives of that region 

 have at some time repeated the names 

 of those uumerals to certain of the 

 Hudson strait people and they have i 

 taught each other. 



The names of the German numerals 

 as sounded by the Koksoagmyut are 

 as follows. The numbers are one to 

 fifteen, consecutively : 



Ai i ; cliu vdi i ; ta li\i i ; pi u' la ; pi 

 li pi; ts^k si; ts<S pa; iik ta; nai na; 

 tse na ; ai hi piik ; elm vAi lu puk ; ta 

 lak si na; pi lik' si na, and pi lip' si na. 



1 have already referred to the game 

 of football as jdayed by these people. 



Fig. 76 represents the football (No. 3070) and the whip for driving 

 it. The Eskimo are very fond of this game. All the people of every 

 age, from the toddling infant to the aged female with bended back, love 



Fig. 76. — Footliall and driver. Kok- 

 soagmyut. 



