Ethnological Sketch of the Angsagmalik Eskimo. 131 



home with me. I could not deny that I preferred to keep it for 

 another time. 



Winter supplies. — The winter provisions of the Angmag- 

 sahks consist of dried meat, frozen seals, bags containing blubber 

 and also tugdleriinat, berries, bear blubber, paws, skin scrapings, 

 matak (whale's skin) etc. The blubber bags are made of sealskin. 



The dried flesh, which is collected in bundles, in such a way 

 that there is one seal in each bundle, is kept in mountain crevices 

 or caves at a distance from the house, often in places which are 

 difficult of access in winter, in order that they may not be tempted 

 to consume it before it is necessary. 



Many seals which are caught in spring are deposited close by 

 the house for them to freeze. In several places we have seen over 

 a score of big frozen seals laid side by side. 



Amongst the winter provisions they usually have great quanti- 

 ties of blubber. It is kept in stone pits not far from the house. 



In former days angmagsat formed no small part of the win- 

 ter provisions, but in more recent years the supply of them has 

 been rather scanty. 



Time of dearth. — In the course of the winter there comes a period 

 which is called the 'time of famine'. The name must not be taken 

 literally; actually it is a kind of fast. The 'time of famine' 

 is the period when they have no fresh seal flesh, which, of course, 

 depends upon when their supply of entire frozen seals run short, 

 and also on the game they catch during the winter. 



Even if they have large quantities of shark's flesh and dried 

 seal's flesh as well as mussels and eatable sea-weed, they call it 

 famine. 



But the famine is genuine enough when the pack-ice which 

 has drifted to land and been pressed forward into the fjords early 

 in winter, freezes fast there. It becomes one frozen mass and is 

 gradually covered with snow, so that hunting is impossible. 



This was the case in the winter of 1881 — 82 at Angmagsalik 

 and in 1882—83 at Inigsalik, a little south of Sermilik. The famine 

 in these places was so severe that the survivors even eat the corpses 

 of the dead. 



In the winter of 1881 — 82 there lived at Kernertorsuit (between 

 Tasiusarsik and Ikerasarsuak) the parents of the angakok Kunit, 

 Kunit himself with his wife Aitsiua and two children, Aitsiva's 

 mother, Keligasak with her husband, two nearly grown-up daugh- 

 ters, two grown-up sons, and three small children, and finally Kuta- 

 luk's cousin with his wife, who was likewise a daughter of Keliga- 



9* 



