54. W. THALBITZER and HJALMAR THUREN. 
I may say that I was successful in collecting a complete material 
on my phonograph, to represent the poetry, ritual expressions and 
music of the Ammassalik natives, from men, women and children 
of all ages. 
Most of the rolls were first obtained after New Year 1906; the last 
of them shortly before the arrival of the ship at the end of August. 
Music is the language of the feelings. The following collection | 
of melodies will show that the East Greenlander seeks expression in 
his music as in his poesy for many different sentiments. His soul 
is an instrument with many strings, not so far-reaching and not so 
refined as the European’s, but by no means simple or really primitive. 
To our ears the Greenland music sounds like a foreign language, in- 
comprehensible and monotonous; but there is no reason for believing 
that it contains no meaning and sentiment for those singing it — on 
the contrary, the Eskimo finds only beauty in his own music. His 
sense of the beautiful in this as in other spheres has followed its 
own original development, different from ours. From our side a 
long period’s habituation is required to understand his point of 
view and we must get away from our limited dogmas on what is 
beautiful. 
But one thing at once stands out clearly in these songs; that 
the music of the Greenlanders embraces the same contrast we know 
of in our own music between idyll and suffering, between native 
simplicity and bold rejoicing or defiance. It is sufficient to compare 
the simple children’s songs, which a mother sings for her child or 
which the children sing to pass the time in the hut or on the fells, 
with the moving, often wild tones of the drum-songs, in which the 
seriousness of life is given artistic form. In these serious songs the 
most eastern Eskimo has found expression for his religious feelings, 
feelings of exaltation or for hostile, bitter and scornful feelings. 
The wild instincts of human nature can be heard in the juridical 
drum-songs, especially in the hooting or ironical wails which some- 
limes interrupt, sometimes end this kind of song. A wild mirth, 
often with satirical or with erotic undercurrent, breaks forth in 
many of the recitative interruptions of the character songs and songs 
of amusement. The singer, man or woman, is in these possessed 
usually by a powerful and rising passion, which shows itself in the 
strength of the voice, the tightening. of the facial muscles and the 
half-closed eyes, in the rapid turnings of the dance-movements of 
the body and in the resounding beats of the drum-stick; but in 
spite of this inner and outer unrest, which in a short time brings 
