CUSTOMS OF VITAE ESKIMOS. 171 
instance, when the supply of food at any particular place 
becomes exhausted, and through starvation the people are 
forced to go elsewhere in search of the necessaries of 
life, the aged or feeble, or those who have become too 
weak to travel, are left behind to perish. If, however, 
food is soon found, a portion is at once taken back, and 
after all, what more could be done, even by white 
people ? | 
When an Eskimo dies at home in the igloe, his 
body is never taken away for burial by carrying it out. 
through the doorway, but an opening must be made in 
the rear for its removal. The place chosen for the burial 
of the dead is some almost isolated point of land, a hill- 
top difficult of access, or some remote island where there 
is the least danger of the bodies being disturbed by wild 
‘beasts. 
The deceased are first wrapped in their skin robes, 
then laid to rest and covered over with piles of stones. 
At times these graves are made very large, while in 
other cases the bodies are barely covered over. Usually 
some kind of a memorial is raised over the grave: fre- 
quently a long stone, but more often a topick pole or 
paddle, to the top of which a flag or streamer is fixed to 
mark the last lonely resting-place of the departed. 
Beside the lonely grave are placed the hunting imple- 
ments of its occupant, and there, upon the dreary waste, 
imprisoned in his rocky tomb beneath the snows of many 
a winter storm, the poor Eskimo hes awaiting the sound 
of the last trumpet. 
