514 



SECOND VOYAGE FOR THE DISCOVERY 



described by Hearne, they crowded round us in the hut, listening with mute 

 and almost breathless attention ; and the mothers drew their children closer 

 to them, as if to guard them from the dreadful catastrophe. It is worthy 

 of notice, that they call the Indians by a name (Eert-kei-lee) which appears 

 evidently the same as that * applied by the Greenlanders to the man-eaters 

 supposed to inhabit the eastern coast of their country, and to whom terror 

 has assigned a face like that of a dog. 



The Esquimaux take some animals in traps, and by a very ingenious con- 

 trivance of this kind they caught two wolves at Winter Island. It consists of 

 a small house built of ice, at one end of which a door, made of the same 

 plentiful material, is fitted to slide up and down in a groove ; to the upper 

 part of this a line is attached and, passing over the roof, is led down into the 

 trap at the inner end, and there held by slipping an eye in the end of it over 

 a peg of ice left for the purpose. Over the peg, however, is previously 

 placed a loose grummet, to which the bait is fastened, and a false roof placed 

 over all to hide the line. The moment the animal drags at the bait the 

 grummet slips off the peg, bringing with it the line that held up the door, 

 and this falling down closes the trap and secures him. 



A trap for birds is formed by building a house of snow just large enough 

 to contain one person, who closes himself up in it. On the top is left a small 

 aperture, through which the man thrusts one of his hands to secure the bird 

 the moment he alights to take away a bait of meat laid beside it. It is prin- 

 cipally gulls that are taken thus ; and the boys sometimes amuse themselves in 

 this manner. A trap in which they catch foxes has been mentioned in ano- 

 ther place. 



The sledges belonging to these Esquimaux were in general large and 

 heavily constructed, being more adapted to the carriage of considerable 

 burdens than to very quick travelling. They varied in size, being from six 

 and a half to nine feet in length, and from eighteen inches to two feet in 

 breadth. Some of those at Igloolik were of larger dimensions, one being 

 eleven feet in length, and weighing two hundred and sixty-eight pounds, 

 and two or three others above two hundred pounds. The runners are 

 sometimes made of the right and left jaw-bones of a whale ; but more 

 commonly of several pieces of wood or bone scarfed smd lashed together, 

 the interstices being filled to make all smooth and firm with moss stuffed 



* Erkiglit. Crantz, I. 208, 269. 



