104 Canadian Arctic Expedition, 1913-18 



fry, two seasons old, that are making their way down to the sea. The migration 

 ends when summer begins, and the Eskimos then wander over the land in search 

 of caribou. Autumn finds them jigging again through the ice of the lakes. 

 Life varies somewhat with the different economic conditions; while one band 

 of Eskimos is hunting caribou or musk-oxen, another, fifty or a hundred Tiiles 

 away, may be snaring squirrels, or gaffing sahnon in the rivers, while still a 

 third is jigging for trout and salmon through the ice of the lakes. Thus at the 

 end of May, 1916, there was a settlement of natives on a small island off the 

 mouth of the Coppermine river, another at Cape Franklin on Victoria island, 

 and a third at Bernard harbour. In the first the natives were hunting caribou, 

 in the second they were both sealing and hunting caribou, in the third they 

 were hunting caribou and fishing inland in one of the lakes. The presence of 

 several traders and of a Hudson's Bay Company's post in the country since 

 1916, together with the introduction of rifles, has already caused a considerable 

 modification in the seasonal movements of the Copper Eskimos, with the excep- 

 tion of those round Prince Albert sound, and the natives east of Kent peninsula. 



(Photo by J. J. O'Neail 



Fig. 33. Fish hung up to dry, Nulahugyuk creek, near Bernard harbour 



The Copper Eskimos seldom take- the trouble to clean their fish before 

 boiling them. The intestines are drawn out and eaten raw, the remainder 

 divided into large cross-sections and inserted into the pot. Many of the fish 

 are very fat, and the top of the water becomes coated with oil, which the natives 

 remove with the bottom of their horn ladles, and lick up with great gusto. The 

 head, too, is rather a dainty, especially the eyes, because of the fat that surrounds 

 them. Nothing is ever wasted; the Eskimos even suck the roots of the fins 

 in order to extract the last remiiants of meat and fat. In the harvest season 

 of late spring, when as many fish as possible are dried and stored away, the 

 heads are often the only parts that are cooked. Every bone in them is taken 

 apart and sucked separately. The natives give them special names from 

 fancied resemblances to natural objects; there is the ptarmigan, for example, 

 the hare and the raven, while the five teeth in the front of the upper jaw are 

 "polar bear's claws." 



Fish that are intended for drying are slit from the anal fin to the anus, 

 then from the gills along each side of the spine; finally they are severed at the 

 root of the tail. This leaves the two sides hanging from the tail ready to be 

 laid across a pole to dry, while the head remains attached to the spine. The 



