LAST VOYAGE OF CAPT. ROSS. 
523 
only be considered as each of them constituting one family, 
more or less numerous, according to the time that a particular 
number of them have determined to separate from the parent 
stock, to form a tribe or family amongst themselves. Thus, it 
very seldom happens, that an Esquimaux girl will look for, or 
accept of a husband out of her own immediate family or tribe; 
and, in this respect, they bear a strong resemblance to the 
gypsies, who very seldom intermarry with each other. It 
has been generally asserted, that polygamy is not conducive 
to population, and for that reason it is the intention of Dr. 
Mallhus to have a bill introduced into Parliament, with the 
intent of legalizing polygamy in this country; although he 
ought, primarily, to adopt some measures, by which the people 
of this country shall become polygamists, with their own free 
will: for it is too frequently seen, that rather than take a second 
wife, the husband would deem it one of the greatest blessings, 
that could be conferred upon him, if he could, by any legal or 
decent means, disencumber himself of the wife, that he has got. 
There was, however, no proof forthcoming, during the time 
that the sailors were acquainted with the Esquimaux bigamist, 
that he had" any particular reason to complain of his fate—not 
that he was better clad, or that his toopik was kept in better 
order, in consequence of his having two wives to clean it, in¬ 
stead of one : for, in regard to the former, the w hole of the tribe 
were in a state of complete nudity, with the exception of a deer 
skin thrown over them, which served them in the day for 
clothing, and in the night for their bedding ; and in regard to 
the latter, neither of the wives could complain of performing a 
greater degree of labor than the other ; for, as the tent or toopik 
was never cleaned at all, and the dirt and filth suffered to accu¬ 
mulate, until an English pig-stye, in its dirtiest state, was 
comparatively a place of cleanliness to it, it was not to be sup¬ 
posed, that any ground for quarrelling could exist on a subject, 
on which both of them appeared to be exactly of one accord. 
The summer huts of these people differ greatly from their 
winter ones. Their mode of erecting them, is, in the first place, 
to make a circle of stones, about seven feet in diameter : a pole 
