LAST VOYAGE OF CA1T. ROSS* 
233 
vicinity of which they sit cowering with a patience that might 
serve as an example to the juvenile angler ; for the uninitiated 
observer would take the form of the Esquimaux, to be some fixed 
and unshapen mass, having neither life nor animation, so intent is 
the anxious creature in watching every motion of the water, with 
the hope of beholding the projecting snout of the animal, which 
is to furnish so dainty a meal to the fortunate captor. 
Notwithstanding the many rebuffs which the Esquimaux had 
endured relative to their reception on board the ship, not a day 
elapsed scarcely without some of them paying a visit, and bring¬ 
ing with them some of their manufactured articles, apparently 
with the view of being restored to the favour and the privileges 
which they had formerly enjoyed. On the 31st, a great number 
came to the ship, amongst whom was the mother of Tullooachiu, 
a very aged woman, whose chief intent in visiting the vessel was 
to obtain a sight of the individual, who had rendered her son 
such an essential service by the manufacture of the wooden leg. 
The carpenter was no sooner pointed out to her, than the aged 
lady threw her arms around him, and began the ceremony of 
kooniging, with as much fervour and ardour as she might have 
evinced in her more juvenile days; she fondled over him as if 
he had been some dear relative, whom she had not seen for 
a lapse of years, and in her wild unsophisticated manners the 
observer of human nature might have learned the lesson, that 
the virtue of gratitude belongs not exclusively to the civilized 
creature, but that it is equally to be seen in its genuine brightness 
in the snow hut of the Esquimaux, or the wigwam of the Indian. 
This day being the sabbath, the crew were called to divine 
service at 10 o’clock, and in their absence the female part of the 
tribe returned to their huts, but the men remained, and as soon 
as the service was over, they joined the sailors on the ice playing 
with them at foot ball and leapfrog, and certainly nothing could 
be more ludicrous than their rude attempts at jumping in the latter 
game, in which they were greatly impeded by the particular 
make of their clothes, which would not permit them to take the 
necessary stride with their legs, so as to clear the back, over 
which they had to jump. It must also be supposed that the 
10 2 h 
