OF A NORTH-WEST PASSAGE. 



543 



There is only one verse to this song, and that, from its commencing with 

 the word % pilletay," we supposed to be a begging one. Of the words of 

 their songs in general, I cannot, from my imperfect knowledge of their lan- 

 guage, pretend to speak very accurately. From the occasional introduction 

 of the words " sledge, canoe, spear," and others of that kind with which 

 we were acquainted, it is probable that their own exploits by sea and land 

 orm the principal subjects. The last song is not so often sung as the first, 

 which these cheerful creatures unconsciously strike up every hour in the 

 day, and which seems to beguile the time both to themselves and their 

 children, under almost any circumstances in which they can be placed. The 

 men seldom sing, and perhaps consider it unmanly ; for we never heard them 

 but at our request, and even then they soon left the women to finish 

 the ditty. Their province rather seems to be to invoke the muse of the 

 women at the games before described. 



During the season passed at Winter Island, which appears to have been a 

 healthy one to the Esquimaux, we had little opportunity of becoming 

 acquainted with the diseases to which they are subject. Our subsequent 

 intercourse with a greater number of these people at Igloolik, having unfor- 

 tunately afforded more frequent and fatal instances of sickness among them, 

 I here insert Mr. Edwards's remarks on this subject. 



f Exempted as these people are from a host of diseases usually ascribed to 

 the vitiated habits of more civilized life, as well as from those equally numer- 

 ous and more destructive ones engendered by the pestilential effluvia that 

 float in the atmosphere of more favoured climes, the diversity of their mala- 

 dies is, as might a priori be inferred, very limited. But, unfortunately, that 

 improvidence which is so remarkable in their kindred tribes is also with them 

 proof against the repeated lessons of bitter experience they are doomed to 

 endure. Alternate excesses and privations mark their progress through life, 

 and consequent misery in one or another shape is an active agent in effect- 

 ing as much mischief amongst them as the diseases above alluded to pro- 

 duce in other countries. The mortality arising from a few diseases and 

 wretchedness combined seems sufficient to check any thing like a progressive 

 increase of their numbers. The great proportion of deaths to births that 

 occurred during the period of our intercourse with them has already been 

 noticed. 



