660 DOGS AND SAVAGES. 



of walrus hide. Toward the middle of 1870 there were in all northern 

 Greenland only 155 draft dogs. 1 On the northern shore of Hudson 

 Strait and in King Williams Land the training is much better than 

 in Greenland, because here the whip is seldom used, the refractory 

 ones being punished with snowballs or, at most, by throwing sticks at 

 them. Since it is assumed that the Eskimos owned dogs before their 

 distribution was as wide as it is now, it is of interest to note the calls 

 with which the different races, separated from each other, direct their 

 animals. The Greenlander driver, writes Bessels, has only the call 

 i! i! i!, short and spoken in falsetto. If he wishes the dogs to turn to 

 the right, he cracks his whip on the left side, and vice versa. A short 

 whistle means stop ! This is the custom of all the inhabitants of the 

 mission parts of Greenland. Those on the east shore of Smiths Sound 

 call out a vehement ha! ha! ha! The method of guidance is as before 

 mentioned. The stop call is oh! In the neighborhood of Ponds Bay 

 the call for turning to the right is woa-ah-ha-hd-hd ! ; for the left, ah-ivoa- 

 waha!; for halt, oh! 



In Cumberland the sounds used are woa-hau-hd ! for the right, ach-icoa- 

 toit! or ach-ivda-wda ! for the left, ha-ha-a for urging onward, and sim- 

 ilarly by the Itaners on Smiths Sound. Stop is oh ! 



With the Eskimos on the Hudson Strait only the exclamation owl 

 oic! ow ! is used, and those on King Williams Land know only the call 

 Tcgu! hgu! Jcgu! The lash is unknown; one person goes before and 

 leads the dogs or presses a stick of wood against the side opposite to the 

 direction in which they should go. Bessels could not learn what was 

 the custom in Alaska; many were of the opinion that they only heard 

 curses, the embellishment of which depended on the obstinacy of the 

 dogs or the irritability of the master. There also a person precedes 

 the sledge. The number in a team varies between 4 and 8, and the 

 load for a sledge is rarely more than 100 pounds. Well-kept animals 

 cover, on a smooth road, 4 German miles an hour, and work twelve hours 

 a day. After work they receive a pound of meat or fish. isTeuinayer 

 remarks in another place that in Labrador the expressions auk! aulc! 

 aulc! for to the right and ra-ra-ra for to the left are us^ed. Many tribes 

 of Eskimos show a pride in the fact that their dog teams are matched in 

 color. 2 According to A. v. Etzel, the legend of the frozen sea, with the 

 mention of dog sledges, known only in the northernmost colonies of 

 South Greenland, is a striking evidence of emigration to South Green- 

 land from the north. 3 In East Greenland the dogs have become extinct 

 through sickness. 4 In conclusion, I will remark that the statements of 



'Geogr. Proceedings, Londou, VIII, 175; Nordenskiold loc. cit. 451; Klutschak, Als 

 Eskimo unter E., p. 50; Geogr. Magazine, London, III, 179, "with exact statistical 

 data; v. Becker, Arktiscke Eeise der engl. Yacht Pandora, p. 15 ; Bessel, Die ainer* 

 Nordpol-Exped., p. 141 et seq. 



2 Darwin, Var., II, 276. 



3Zeitschr. f. allg. Erdk., N. F., XII, 418. 



4 Peterm.Mitth., 1871,422. 



