Amusements 221 



A Bathurst inlet woman who had associated with some Hudson bay (Pallik) 

 natives said that they played the game in a slightly different manner. The 

 seal-bone was swung a half-circle while the player counted consecutively the 

 following rigmarole : 



" I sleep, I wake, I rise, I light the lamp, I put on my coat, I put on my 

 boots, I put on my mitts, my knife I take, I open the door, I go outside, my 

 long knife I take, I look around, I look round again, I gaze, I spy (a caribou), 

 I go towards it, I reach it, I shoot, I shoot again, I shoot again." 



From the first " I shoot" the seal-bone is swung one complete circle and 

 caught during the second. At the last word " I shoot again," when the caribou 

 is supposed to be killed, the player says " I am dead" and the game is finished. 

 If he misses at any stage he hands the toy to his rival, and whoever is " dead" 

 first wins the game. 



Bathurst inlet natives who visited our station in the early spring of 1916 

 were responsible for the introduction of a new game, nugluak, into that region. 

 The natives had learned it from the Eskimos of Backs river, so that it has 

 evidently spread north from Hudson bay.^ About a dozen men and women 

 were playing it in May beside our station. A short flat bone plate about two 

 inches long was made fast by cords of sinew to the ridge pole of the tent above 

 and to a large stone on the floor below, so that it was suspended taut some 

 two feet above the ground. A small hole had been drilled in the middle of 

 the plate, and the natives, sitting all round in a ring, tried to push darts through 

 it, the darts being shafts of wood from two to four feet long pointed with horn. 

 They were all spearing at once, and their darts rattled together and pushed 

 each other away; the plate too quivered and shook, so that sometimes a minute 

 would elapse before one of them penetrated the hole. As one player grew 

 tired and withdrew another took his place. Half their days for nearly a week 

 were spent in this idle occupation. It was the only game, as far as I know, in 

 which the natives gambled. They would stake knives and cartridges and 

 powder and almost anything else they had, and the same knife would pass 

 through several hands in the course of a single day. 



We come now to the more athletic games and pastimes, practiced on 

 stormy winter days in the dance-house, or, in some cases, during sled migrations. 

 Often a stick would be pushed into the side of a sled so that it projected hori- 

 zontally about three feet above the ground, and one after another the men and 

 women would jump up and kick it with the toes of both feet simultaneously. 

 Novices often fall on their backs in this game, a castatrophe that invariably 

 provokes much laughter. 



Skipping is a pastime enjoyed by both sexes, mainly of course by the 

 young, although I have seen adult men skipping during a migration when the 

 train had stopped to rest; in such cases it serves the double purpose of amusing 

 them and of keeping them warm. The Eskimos skip rather differently from 

 us. The rope, which is usually a dog-trace, is swung by two players under 

 the feet of the skipper, then back in the opposite direction. It is thus made 

 to circle backwards and forwards, now in one direction, now in the other, while 

 the skipper hops alternately on each foot. Occasionally he may try to circle 

 round, but usually the rope catches in his feet after the first or second turn. 

 The rope being of raw hide, and very hard, the natives often tie a strip of polar 

 bear skin round the middle to keep it from bruising the ankles. 



Wresthng is practiced by the men only as a rule, though children often 

 push and shove each other about in an attempt to imitate their elders. The 

 game usually takes place in the dance-house, especially after a successful seal- 

 hunt, when the people are rejoicing over their good fortune, or in stormy weather, 



island 



'See quotation in Culin, p. 472 et seq. Mr. Stefansson mentions a game with the same name at Bailiie 

 id (Anthrop. Papers, A.M.N.H., Vol. XIV, pt. I, p. 348.) * 



