SCIENCE. 
218 
cessful ancoot for a long time he may become a great 
ancoot ; this necessitates a period of fasting, and then, 
as the story goes, an animal they call amctrook (the 
same word is used for wolf, and for an animal which 
is probably mythical, unless it can be a Gulo) comes 
into his hut and bites the man, who immediately falls 
to pieces; his bones are then conveyed to the sea, 
where he lives for some time as a walrus ; he finally 
returns among his people, a man in appearance, but 
a God in power. 
If the prophecy of an ancoot does not come to pass 
as he had said it would, any phenomenon of nature, 
as a halo, corona, aurora, etc., is sufficient to have 
broken the spell, and the ancoot loses nothing of his 
reputation by the failure, for it is then believed that 
the measure, whatever it might have been, was not 
pleasing to Torngarsuk. 
The people come to these soothsayers after all 
manner of information. We knew of one case where 
a young woman asked an ancoot if her yet unborn 
child would be a boy or girl. He retired outside the 
hut for a few moments, and when he returned he said 
it would “be a boy ” ; but he adds, “If it is not a 
boy, it will be a girl” ! For this valuable information 
he charged three seal skins and a knife. As a gen- 
eral thing, the ancoots are paid according to their 
reputation ; still, it is very seldom they refuse to give 
them what they ask for in return for their valuable 
services. 
They seem to have an idea of a future state, but 
what we denominate as the region down below they 
consider as the best place. In Egede’s “ Groenlands 
nye Perlustration, year 1741,” is given a legend which 
is almost exactly the same as one that is found among 
the Cumberland Eskimo at the present day. But 
Egede says, in the Danish translation, “ Himmel,” 
heaven, as though this was the equivalent for the 
Greenlander’s word ; the Eskimo of Cumberland say 
“ topani,” which means simply “ up.” They do not 
distinguish any difference in the soul’s condition after 
death, or rather of the two places where they expect 
to live hereafter ; one differs from the other only in 
this wise, that if death is caused by certain means 
they go to the one, and if they die a natural death 
they go to the other. 
The following is their idea of the future : “ In the 
spirit-land all will have it as good or better than they 
had it on earth.” Yet they designate two places 
where the soul goes after death, viz : “ Some go up ; 
others far down into the earth.” But the lower place 
is considered preferable. This is described as a 
beautiful land, with everlasting sunshine, where the 
seal and reindeer abound in fabulous quantities, and 
food is consequently abundant. To this latter place 
go only such as are killed by other Eskimo, women 
who die in child-birth, such as drown in salt water, 
and whalers ; they think, this being the better place, 
it is a sort of recompense for the suffering they under- 
went on earth ; all the rest go up. 
In this connection, we will mention that the Cum- 
berland Eskimo think the aurora borealis is the 
spirits of dead Eskimo dancing and having a good 
time generally. It has even considerable influence 
over them, and they are well pleased to see a bright 
aurora. The Greenlanders, on the other hand, say it 
is the spirits of dead Eskimo fighting. 
MULTIPLE SPECTRA 1 
111. 
I have endeavored to show in the previous articles that 
there are many facts which justify the conclusion that the 
same elementary substance in a state of purity can under 
different conditions give us spectra different in kind. To 
those spectra to which special reference is now made the 
names of lined and fluted have been given to mark their 
chief point of difference, which is that in lined spectra we 
deal with lines distributed irregularly over the spectrum ; 
while in fluted spectra we deal with rythmical systems. 
This was the first point, and I showed that the idea was 
suggested that the lined and fluted spectra, though pro- 
duced by the same substance, were produced by that sub- 
stance in a different molecular condition. 
I have pointed out that both in lined and fluted spectra 
taken separately there was evidence of still further compli- 
cation, that is, that a complete lined spectrum of a sub- 
stance and a complete fluted spectrum of a substance, was 
the result of the vibration not of one kind of molecule only, 
but probably of several. 
So that in this view we have to imagine a series, in some 
cases a long series, of molecular simplifications brought 
about by the action of heat, and ascribe the spectral changes 
to these simplifications. 
To understand my contention, and one objection which 
has been taken to it, in the clearest way, let us suppose 
that there is a substance which gives us, under different 
conditions, three spectra, which we will term a , b, and c. 
My view is that these spectra are produced by three distinct 
molecular groupings brought about by successive dissocia- 
tions. On the other hand, it is objected that they are pro- 
duced by one and the same molecule struck, as a bell might 
be struck, in different ways by the heat waves or the electric 
current passing among the molecules. 
In my memoir entitled “Discussion of the Working 
Hypothesis that the so-called Elements are Compound 
Bodies,” I remarked as follows : — 
“ I was careful at the very commencement of this paper to 
point out the fact that the conclusions I have advanced are 
based upon the analogies furnished by those bodies which, 
by common consent and beyond cavil and discussion, are 
compound bodies. Indeed, had I not been careful to urge 
this point, the remark might have been made that the vari- 
ous changes in the spectra to which I shall draw attention 
are not the results of successive dissociations, but are effects 
due to putting the same mass into different kinds of vibra- 
tion or of producing the vibration in different ways. Thus 
the many high notes, both true and false, which can be pro- 
duced out of a bell with or without its fundamental one, 
might have been put forward as analogous with those spec- 
tral lines which are produced at different degrees of tem- 
perature with or without the line, due to each substance 
when vibrating visibly with the lowest temperature. To 
this argument, however, if it were brought forward, the 
reply would be that it proves too much. If it demonstrates 
that the h hydrogen line in the sun is produced by the same 
molecular groupings of hydrogen as that which gives us 
two green lines only when the weakest possible spark is 
taken in hydrogen inclosed in a large glass globe, it also 
proves that calcium is identical with its salts. For we can 
get the spectrum of any of the salts alone without its com- 
mon base, calcium, as yye can get the green lines of hydro- 
gen without the red one. 
“I submit, therefore, that the argument founded on the 
over-notes of a sounding body, such as a bell, cannot be 
urged by any one who believes in the existence of any 
compound bodies at all, because there is no spectroscopic 
break between acknowledged compounds and the sup- 
posed elementary bodies. The spectroscopic differences 
between calcium itself at different temperatures is, as I shall 
show, as great as when we pass from known compounds of 
calcium to .calcium itself. There is a perfect continuity of 
phenomena from one end of the scale of temperature to the 
other.” 
Not only is what may be termed the bell hypothesis op- 
1 Continued from p. 107. 
