474 Notes on the Labrador Eskimo [ May, 
here they were first met with in the eleventh century by the dis- 
coverers of Wineland. But when they were compelled to evac- 
uate these possessions likewise, by the numerous tribes of Indians 
superior to themselves in strength and valor, who thronged to 
the north out of Florida, they receded nearer to the pole, as far 
as the 6oth deg. Here Ellis in his voyage to Hudson’s bay 
- found the Esquimaux; resembling the Greenlanders in every par- 
ticular of dress, figure, boats, weapons, houses, manners and cus- 
toms. * * * The clerk of the California says that these 
Esquimaux are grievously harassed by the Indians inhabiting 
the south and west shores of Hudson’s bay, who are in all respects 
a distinct race. An unsuccessful hunting or fishing expedition is 
a sufficient pretext for their oppressors to fall upon them and take 
them prisoners or murder them. These- acts of violence have in- 
duced the fugitives to retreat so far to the northward ; and part 
of them in all probability passed over to Greenland in the four- 
teenth century, either crossing Davis’s strait in their boats from 
Cape Walsingham, in lat. 66° to the South bay, a distance of 
scarcely forty leagues, or otherwise proceeding by land round the 
extremity of Baffin’s bay, where, if we may trust the reports of 
the Greenlanders, stone-crosses, like guide-posts, are still to be 
seen at intervals along the coast.” 
That the Eskimo were more abundant on the eastern vee of 
Hudson’s bay may be proved by the following extracts from 
Coats’ Notes on the geography of Hudson’s bay, reprinted 
by the Hakluyt Society® It appears from his notes that the 
Eskimo inhabited Labrador from the Gulf of St. Lawrence 
around to James bay, t. e., as far south in Hudson’s bay as Bel- 
cher’s island (lat. 56° 06’) and the Sleepers. Their southern 
range was probably Hazard gulf, in lat. 56° 22’; the coast of 
Hudson’s bay is wild and barren, with floating ice. Speaking of 
the barren, treeless coast from Cape Diggs to Hazard gulf, Coats 
says: “ Doubtless the native Usquemows know the time and sea- 
sons of those haunts, and nick it, for we found vestiges of them 
1 Charlevois derives this name from the Indian word Zskimantsik, which in the 
language of the Abenaquis signifies fo cat raw; and it is certain that they eat raw 
fish. 
2 Account of a voyage for the discovery of a north-west passage, Vol. Il, p- 43+ 
= ‘Notes on the Geography of Hudson’s bay, being the remarks of Capt. W. Coats 
in many voyages to that locality between the years 1727 and 1751. Edited by John 
Barrow. London, Hakluyt Society, 1852. 8vo. 
