438 



SECOND VOYAGE FOR THE DISCOVERY 



1823. w e saw j n t] ie course of the day a few deer, numerous king and long- 

 tailed ducks, and red-throated divers ; also some geese then new to us, and 

 which, on procuring a specimen a day or two after, proved to be the snow- 

 goose {anas kyberborea). These last are fond of feeding on the wet grass 

 and moss on the banks of the numerous streams and lakes in this country. 

 They were seen at Arlagnuk, and by Captain Lyon on his journey, about the 

 same time, so that the period of their arrival in this latitude seems to have 

 been very well marked. 

 Wed. 25. On the morning of the 25th, while passing close to a point of land, 

 Toolemak suddenly stopped his sledge, and he and his wife walked to the 

 shore, whither I immediately followed them. The old woman, preceding 

 her husband, went up to a circle of stones, of which there were two or three 

 on the spot, and kneeling down within it cried most loudly and bitterly for 

 the space of two or three minutes, while Toolemak also shed abundant tears, 

 but without any loud lamentation. On inquiring presently after, I found 

 that this was the spot on which their tent had been pitched in the summer, 

 and that the bed-place on which the old woman knelt had been that of their 

 adopted son Noogloo, whose premature death we had all so much regretted. 

 The grief displayed on this occasion seemed to have much sincerity in it, 

 and there was something extremely touching in this quiet but unaffected 

 tribute of sorrow on the spot, which so forcibly reminded them of the object 

 of their parental affection. I have much gratification in adding in this place 

 another circumstance which, though trifling in itself, deserves to be no- 

 ticed as doing honour to these people's hearts. They had always shewn par- 

 ticular attachment to a dog they had sold me, and which bore the same 

 name as a young man, a son of their own, whom they had formerly lost. In 

 the course of this journey, the old woman would constantly call the dog 

 " Eerninga" (son), which the affectionate animal never failed to repay by 

 jumping up and licking her face all over, whenever his trace would allow 

 him ; and at night, after Toolemak had fed his own dogs, he frequently 

 brought to our tent an extra piece of meat expressly for Amiowtalik, to whom 

 these poor people seemed to take a mournful pleasure in now transferring 

 their affection. 



Landing close to the head of the inlet on the south shore, we proceeded 

 with difficulty a couple of miles over land till we came to a river, the limits 

 of which the warmth of the weather was just rendering discernible, and 

 which our guides informed us was to be our fishing-place. It was interest- 



