JX. BROWN ON THE MAMMALS OF GREENLAND. 33 



by them Piglertok ('' the springer "), Frabricius thought that he 

 recognized the Common Frog, and has accordingly entered the 

 Bana temporaria as a member of the Greenland fauna. He, 

 however, saw no specimens, nor is such an animal known in Green- 

 land, where there are no species of Reptiles or Batrachians found. 

 About the southern portion of Disco Bay, the natives use the name 

 as a sort of slaiig title to the Nisa {Phocmna communis^ Brookes), 

 the Marsvlin of the Danes in Greenland,* from its tumbling or 

 springing movements while disporting itself. Jansen {lib. cit. 

 p. 59) gives the word iu the south Greenland dialect as pisigsartui 

 or pigdlertut, and translates it " grasshopper " {grcBshopper). 



I will not stop to inquire into their grosser myths, which, though 

 relating to animals, are yet only remotely connected with zoolo- 

 gical science, and wander away into the domains of mythology, 

 interesting enough, no doubt, but with which we, as zoologists, 

 have but little to do. For instance, as far back as the days of 

 Fabricius, they used to talk about men living away in the glens 

 off from the coast. " They tell tales " (fabulantur), he says, *' of 

 other people living away among the mountains, rarely seen by 

 tbem, never by the Europeans, whom they call Torngit (sing. 

 Tunnek) or Timnersoit, and even say that they have the ap- 

 pearance, stature, and clothing of Europeans. ...... If 



they speak truly, which I am not in a position to deny, per- 

 haps they are the remnants of the former Icelandic colonists, 

 who have fled in among the mountains."! About Jakobs- 

 havn they still talk of these people, and I collected many such 

 stories. Some of these superstitions describe the Torngit as 

 little men; and I know a man who says he saw one of these 

 little men "pop out of a hole and in again" most agilely, 

 and he tells a long story about it. Others describe them as tall 

 men; so that these are undoubtedly only traditions of the old 

 Norsemen. During the Norse possession of the country, the 

 population appears to have got much amalgamated (as indeed we 

 know, because when Hans Egede came, there were many traces 

 of the white stock; and to this day there come from the east 

 coast natives with blue eyes, and fairer hair than is usual in 

 GreenlandJ) with the Icelandic adventurers who came with red- 

 haired Erik, and subsequently imbibed much of their superstition. 

 Indeed most of the best Eskimo traditions (as related by Rink in 

 his " Eskimoiske Eventyr og Sagn ") are of Scandinavian parent- 

 age. Accordingly we find the old Norse tale of that fearful 



* Called in Sweden Marsinn and Tumlare, in Finnish Merisika, and in 

 Norse Ise and Nise, from which, apparently, the Eskimo name Nisa is 

 derived, as are not a few of the Greenland words, from their intercourse with 

 the old Norsemen prior to the Middle Ages. I suspect Piylertok, now the 

 vulgar term, was originally the native one. 



t Fauna Groenl., p. 4. 



X A Moravian Missionary at Pamiadluk, n&ar Cape Farewell, told Captain 

 Carl W. Neilsen (who told me) that, in 1850, a party of natives came to that 

 settlement from the east coast, and declared that it was two years since they 

 had left their homes. They were described as tall and fair-haired. Almost 

 every year some come and permanently set'le in the Danish colonies. 

 36122. r 



