Social Organization _ 91 



would leave a little in the pot for such Eskimos as happened to be present. 

 Often their would be twenty natives and only one plateful of rice among them 

 all, but everyone, even the smallest child, had to receive a taste of it^. 



Even children are regarded in some respects as the property of their parents. 

 It is the parents, for example, who decide whether a newly-born babe shall be 

 reared or not. If it is cast out alive another couple may recover it and rear it 

 as their own child without payment, the parents having lost all claim; but in 

 all ordinary cases of adoption the parents must be compensated before they 



(Photo by G. H. Wilkins) 

 Fig. 31. Caches raised on stones to protect them from the foxes 



will relinquish their rights. Ikpakhuak paid the father of Haugak (the mother 

 being dead) a knife and a wooden dish for the boy; thereafter the father ceased 

 to have any claim on him, and he became a member of Ikpakhuak's family. 

 When a girl marries, the husband as a rule pays her parents nothing, because 

 the newly-wed couple generally remain in the same neighbourhood, and the 

 parents still have the benefit of the girl's (and the husband's) services whenever 

 they are needed; but if the husband intends to take his bride away to another 

 place he has to compensate her parents for their loss. 



The land is the property of the community which uses it as a hunting and 

 fishing ground. Strangers have no rights there unless they are accepted as mem- 

 bers of the tribe for the time being, and conform to its customs in such matters 

 as the sharing of food. No Copper Eskimo family, of course, would dream of 



'When living with Ikpakhuak and his family I would take what I wanted of the food, then hand 

 the pot to Higilak to serve her husband. She would set out his portion, and her own with it, then pass 

 round the remainder among the visitors. It was very amusing sometimes to watch her fill the spoon 

 tell some full-grown man to open his mouth, then cram the spoon and its contents nearly down his throat' 



