Ethnological Sketch of the Angmagsalik Eskimo. Q\ 



and they often while the time away by catching them in each 

 others heads, and then gravely placing them between the teeth of 

 the owner. It is regarded as a bad symptom when the parasites leave 

 a man, for then they suppose the man is ill and is bound to die 

 within a short time. 



There are no set times for meals: when there is plenty of meat 

 the cooking-pots are constantly hanging over the lamps and food 

 is eaten at odd times during the day. However, the meal which is 

 taken when the hunter returns home in the evening, may be re- 

 garded as the principal meal in the day. The hunter then eats 

 what his wife has cooked for him, as a rule before the game has 

 been cut up. In winter the seals are dragged into the house, 

 where they are cut up, a job which is often performed by the 

 hunter himself. A great deal of the flesh and the entrails is eaten 

 raw, especially if it is mikiak (half-rotten). Small children, not 

 yet weaned, are given this raw flesh to eat and devour it with great 

 avidity. 



Shark flesh is as a rule eaten rotten; but \vhen it is boiled 

 fresh, it is wrung after the first boiling, and then boiled again in 

 other water. 



Angmagsat (caplins) are excellently cooked, being carefullj^ pla- 

 ced one beside the other in the pot; after which they are stirred 

 and taken out with a fish-spoon. Foxes and ravens are eaten only 

 in times of scarcity. The Angmagsaliks eat a great deal of fresh 

 greens, roots, and berries of the kinds named above, and preserve 

 them right into the winter in blubber bags. Fresh seaweed is eaten 

 the whole year round; in times of scarcity it may even form one 

 of their staple foods. Their only drink is water. 



The Angmagsaliks go to rest as a rule very early in the evening; 

 only on great occasions, as when they receive visits at which anga- 

 kut incantations, drum-dances or games are performed, do they 

 hold out far into the night. 



Childbirth. — As soon as his wife is enceinte, her husband 

 already regards her as the mother of the future hunter, and she is 

 therefore treated with greater consideration. As she herself is ver}^ 

 anxious for the child to be a boy, she wears different kinds of 

 amulets in order to bring about the desired result — whereof more 

 anon. As an instance of the customs which pregnant women sub- 

 ject themselves to, I shall only mention, that a man did not allow 

 his wife to sit in our tent on account of her being pregnant. Both 

 this man and other men urged me to feel the hands and legs of 

 their pregnant wives, and were very grateful to me for doing so. 



