OF A NORTH-WEST PASSAGE. 



303 



day, we had the satisfaction of seeing another large " patch" from one to 1822 - 

 two miles in width separated from the fixed ice, and soon drifted out of sight L^v^ 

 to the south-east. As we made several tacks off the island next to the ¥nd,£ 

 northward of Igloolik, called by the Esquimaux Neerlo-Nakto, two canoes 

 came off to us, in one of which was Toolemak. He and his companions 

 came on board the Fury, when I employed him for a couple of hours in 

 drawing a chart of the strait. Toolemak, though a sensible and intelligent 

 man, we soon found to be no draftsman, so that his performance in this 

 way, if taken alone, was not a very intelligible delineation of the coast. 

 By dint however of a great deal of talking on his part, and some exercise 

 of patience on ours, we at length obtained a copious verbal illustration of 

 his sketch, which confirmed all our former accounts respecting the existence 

 of a passage to the westward in this immediate neighbourhood, and the 

 large extent of the land called Keiyuk-tarruoke on the northern side of the 

 strait. The word Khemig he applied either to the strait or to some place about 

 its shores, as he had before done to Captain Lyon ; but the weather was at 

 this time unfortunately too thick to allow of his pointing out the exact di- 

 rection in which this interesting spot lay. This piece of information was, 

 just at the moment, desirable only as a matter of extreme curiosity and 

 almost painful interest, as it was certain that the passage was at present 

 inaccessible to ships on account of the ice. Toolemak also agreed with our 

 other Esquimaux informants in stating, that from the coast of Akkoolee no 

 land is visible to the westward ; nor was any ever heard of in that direction 

 by the Esquimaux. This fact they uniformly assert with a whine of sorrow, 

 meaning thereby to intimate that their knowledge and resources are there 

 both at an end. Toolemak represented the coast of Keiyuk-tarruoke as 

 abounding with whales and narwhals, and repeatedly mentioned that ice- 

 bergs were seen on its northern side, as before described by Okotook. The 

 only actual addition to our former information was respecting some Esqui- 

 maux inhabiting an island of considerable size, at a great distance to the 

 eastward or north-east. These people they call by the name of Sead-ler- 

 me-6o, a general term by which they distinguish all Esquimaux not belong- 

 ing to their own tribe, and of whom, with their accustomed self-conceit, 

 they invariably speak with undisguised contempt. It is remarkable that 

 even the natives of Southampton Island, notwithstanding their proximity to 

 the continental coast, come under this denomination ; there being no inter- 

 course whatever, as far as we could learn, between the two tribes. 



