86 
SCIENCE. 
are sore all the time. We are afraid of them ; do not 
like them ; glad they have gone away.” 
This tradition differs somewhat in the particulars 
when told by different individuals, but the main points 
are essentially the same. Many will not tell it all ; 
some, only parts of it. The ridiculous story about the 
dogs is firmly believed by the present Eskimo as the 
origin of these animals. 
That the Tunuk have been seen of late years in 
the west is not improbable — that is, natives, different 
in dress and stature ; but they were most likely the 
tribe known as the Pelly Bay Eskimo from the north 
shores of Hudson’s Straits and from Fox Channel, 
they being larger and more robust than the Cumber- 
land Eskimo of the present day. It is certain that 
since the whalers have begun coming among the 
Cumberland Eskimo, and introduced venereal dis- 
eases, they have deteriorated very much. They now 
almost depend upon ships coming, and as a conse- 
quence are becoming less expert hunters, and more 
careless in the construction of their habitations, which 
are merely rude temporary shelters made at a few 
minutes’ notice. Great suffering often ensues from 
living in these miserable huts. The seal skin that 
should have gone to repair the tent is bartered to the 
whalemen for a little tobacco, or some valueless 
trinket, which is soon thrown aside. The men are 
employed to catch whales, when they should be hunt- 
ing in order to supply the wants of their families ; and 
the women, -half clad, but sporting a gaudy calico 
gown, instead of their comfortable skin clothes, and 
dying of a quick consumption in consequence, when 
they should be repairing garments or preparing skins, 
are loafing around the ships, doing nothing for them- 
selves or any one else. 
The Cumberland Eskimo of to day, with his breech- 
loading rifle, steel knives, cotton jacket, and all the 
various trinkets he succeeds in procuring from the 
ships, is worse clad, lives poorer, and gets less to eat 
than did his forefathers, who had never seen or heard 
of a white man. 
There is a practice among them that is probably of 
long standing, and is regularly carried out every 
season, of going into the interior or up some of the 
large fjords after reindeer. They generally go during 
the months of July and August, returning in Septem- 
ber, to be on hand when the fall whaling begins. 
The purpose of this reindeer hunt is to procure skins 
for their winter clothing. Nearly all return to the 
sound to winter. They have regular settlements, 
which are hardly ever entirely deserted at any season. 
The principal ones are known as Nugunreute, Nian- 
tilic, Newboyant, Kemesuit, Annanactook, Oosooad- 
luin, Ejujuajuin, Kikkerton. and Middliejuacktuack 
Islands, and Shaumeer, situate at different points on 
•both sides of Cumberland Sound. During the winter 
they congregate at these points in little villages of 
snow-huts. 
The present principal headquarters are at the Kik- 
kerton Islands, or at Niantilie, according to which 
point the whalers winter. The old harbor of Kerna- 
suit, once the winter harbor of whalers and a favorite 
resort of the Eskimo, is now deserted, except by a few 
superannuated couples, who manage to catch enough 
seal to live on. 
As a rule, the present race is of short stature, the 
men from five feet three inches to five feet six. There 
are some exceptions, but they are in favor of a less 
rather than a greater height. The women are a little 
shorter. The lower extremities are rather short in 
proportion to the body, and bow-legs are almost the 
rule. This probably arises from the manner in which 
the children are carried in the mother’s hood, as well 
as the early age at which they attempt to walk. The 
habit of sitting cross-legs may also have a tendency to 
produce this deformity. Their hands and feet are 
small and well formed. Their hands are almost 
covered with the scars of cuts and bruises. It seems 
that in healing the injured part rises, and is always 
afterwards disgustingly prominent. There is a great 
variation in the color of their skin, and a description 
that would answer for one might not apply at all to 
another. Even among those that are of pure breed 
there are some whose skins are no darker than a white 
man’s would be if subjected to the rigors of wind and 
cold, and the never-removed accumulation of soot and 
grease. Others again seem to have been “ born so.” 
The children, when young, are quite fair. The 
eyes are small, oblique, and black or very dark brown. 
The hair is black, straight, coarse, and very abundant. 
It is rarely wavy or curly among the full-blooded 
Innuites. 
There are, of course, exceptions to the above in 
case of half-breeds. Their faces are broad and flat, 
with rather large lips and prominent cheek-bones. 
Infanticide is not practiced among the Cumberland 
Eskimo at the present day. I have learned from some 
of the most intelligent that this barbarous custom was 
in vogue in former times, however. Among the 
natives of Repulse Bay, and those living on the north 
shores of Hudson’s Straits, it is practiced to a con- 
siderable extent, especially with the tribe known as 
the Pelly Bay natives. The practice is confined 
almost entirely to female children, the reason being, 
they tell us, that they are unable to hunt, and conse- 
quently of little account. It seems to have been 
referable to the same cause among the Cumberland 
Eskimo. Their intercourse with the whites seems to 
have modified some of the most barbarous of their 
primitive habits. 
Twins are not common, and triplets very rare. The 
males outnumber the females. Infanticide may, to 
some extent, be the cause ; but lung diseases, which 
are alarmingly prevalent, seem more fatal to the 
women than to the men. 
Children are often mated by the parents while they 
are still mere infants. There is such an extreme 
laxity of morals that the young women almost invari- 
ably become wives only a short time before they are 
mothers. 
It is impossible to say at what age the women cease 
to bear children, as they have no idea of their own 
age, and few are able to count above ten. Puberty 
takes place at an early age, possibly at fourteen with 
the female. They are not a prolific race, and it is 
seldom a woman has more than two or three children, 
and often only one, of her own; still many, or almost 
all, have children ; but inquiry will generally divulge 
the fact that some of the children have been bought. 
Almost every young woman has or has had a child, but 
the identity of the father is in no wise necessary in 
