Ethnological Sketch of the Angmagsalik Eskimo. 91 



After an hour's wailing, during which the angakok lay quite 

 still in the dark on the platform behind, everything was made 

 ready. New, dried waterproof skins were hung in front of the house 

 entrance, and other skins in front of the window above the entrance, 

 while the other windows, at least that before which we sat, were 

 left uncovered. After the floor round the entrance had been care- 

 fully swept and scrubbed, and all dirt removed from between the 

 flag-stones, a hair-covered skin folded double was carefully arranged 

 before the door hanging. A large flat stone was placed to the right 

 of the entrance, so that it covered the cavities between the flag-stones. 

 When the drum had been moistened ^), it was laid together with the 

 drumstick upon the flat stone. A long hairy rawhide cord was 

 softened in due form by rubbing and stretching. 



At length Sanimuinak appeared. He had the appearance of a 

 sleep-walker or a visionary, and walked straight on without look- 

 ing to the right or left, and sat down on the skin on the floor. He 

 arranged the flat stone and the drum with great nicety. His 

 hair was bound together in a knot behind, and a rawhide cord 

 pressed down over his forehead. The man who had prepared the 

 long cord now bound the angakok's arms with it behind his back, 

 winding it round them right from the hands to the elbows, and 

 tightened the cord till the hands became quite blue. During this 

 procedure the angakok snorted and groaned, as if he were under the 

 dominion of some mighty power. When he saw that I was watch- 

 ing the binding of the arms with great interest, he said to me in 

 a pitiful tone that 1 could see that it would be impossible for him 

 to untie them. I was assigned a seat on a skin on the floor — a 

 cool position — while all the others crept up onto the platforms 

 one by one. Thereupon the lamps were extinguished, first the one 

 which was furthest to the left of the angakok, then the next in the 

 row, and so on, the one furthest to the right being extinguished last 

 and leaving the house in complete darkness. 



The spirits were immediately summoned with the cries: "Goi! 

 goi goi goi"! — proceeding now from one voice, now" from several, 

 now from one part of the house, now from another. All the while 

 the angakok kept puffing and groaning and heaving heavy sighs. 

 All at once the dr}" skin before the entrance began to rattle, as if 

 caught by a rushing wind. The drum now started into motion, 

 dancing first slowly, then with ever increasing speed, and mounted 

 slowly up to the ceiling. Now ensued a veritable pandemonium of 



") The drum is ahvaj's moistened before using, in order to give it a more beau- 

 tiful ring. 



