LAST VOYAGE OF CAPT. ROSS. 
272 
actions, and particularly, where any fraud was attempted to be 
practised upon him, and in the present case, the conviction was 
si* strong upon them, that he was privy to the whole ol thei 
proceedings, that they confessed that two gluttons had been 
caught in the trap, but by a refinement of reasoning scarcely to 
be expected from such uncultivated creatures, they argued that 
as they had brought the gluttons to the ship, they had rather 
performed an act of kindness, than one for which they should be 
censured; but then Commander Ross informed them, that as the 
gluttons were caught in his own trap, they were consequently 
his property, and therefore they ought not to have demanded 
the same reward, as if they had been caught in traps of their 
own setting. To which the natives replied with all the cunning 
of the jesuit, that they had not exacted the reward for the ani¬ 
mals, but for the trouble of bringing them. There was on the 
part of Commander Ross, no surmounting this piece of deep cas¬ 
uistry, and he simply informed the natives, that for the future he 
would take upon himself the trouble of conveying the captured 
animals to the ship. They appeared fully disposed to acquiesce 
in this determination of the Commander, still no gluttons were 
caught in his trap, although the natives continued to bring 
them. One morning, Commander Ross found a fox in the trap, 
but some circumstances led him to believe, that the animal was 
put there designedly by the natives, for the purpose of deceiving 
him, and appropriating to themselves the whole trade in the 
gluttons, as being far more valuable than the foxes. 
On the 2d a party of Esquimaux came to the ship with the 
information of the death of lilictu, the father of Tullooachiu , and 
who had been drawn to the ship on a sledge, the first day that 
the communication was opened between the natives and the 
crew of the vessel. As this was the first death that had occurred 
in the tribe since the arrival of the Victory, it was the anxious 
desire of Mr. Mc’Diarmid to obtain his corpse, and particularly 
his head, as a subject of comparative anatomy, and the sequel 
will shew the difficulties which attended the acquisition of it. 
The party, who brought the information of the death of lilictu , 
had with them one of the finest dogs, which had been seen in 
