OE THE POLAR SEA. 



49 



Their tents were rudely constructed by 

 tying twenty or thirty poles together at the 

 top, and spreading them out at the base so 

 as to form a cone ; these were covered with 

 dressed moose-skins. The fire is placed in 

 the centre, and a hole is left for the escape 

 of the smoke. The inmates had a squalid 

 look, and were suffering under the com- 

 bined afflictions of hooping-cough and 

 measles ; but even these miseries did not 

 keep them from an excessive indulgence in 

 spirits, which they unhappily can procure 

 from the traders with too much facility ; and 

 they nightly serenaded us with their mono- 

 tonous drunken songs. Their sickness at 

 this time was particularly felt by the tra- 

 ders, this being the season of the year when 

 the exertion of every hunter is required to 

 procure their winter's stock of geese, which 

 resort in immense flocks to the extensive 

 flats in this neighbourhood. These birds, 

 during the summer, retire far to the north, 

 and breed in security ; but, when the ap- 

 proach of winter compels them to seek a 

 more southern climate, they generally alight 

 VOL. i. e 



