Language and Folklore. 405 
grabs it, after having grabbed it, she loosens the fastenings 7 — (then 
first she sees) the mitten soaked in lamp-oil. “O-e-e-h, what in the 
world has it caught!”®® Thus Asiag exclaims: “What in the world 
— it has a great booty! °) After this mighty hauling they will now 
see it, — those who have flown hither.” ©) They look at it. Asiaq hauls 
these great white whales to her?” as though they were great drifting 
carcasses.* (She or) they begin to devour them. What a surprise! 32) 
So she was, such huge big animals she devoured completely! She 
placed them on a dish. Then she let them (the angakok and his 
spirits) come.) Then the one who had flown thither (the angakok) 
said: “You must let it rain!” 
She takes a bearskin as large [as the teller indicates by pointing 
over both elbows], one thick with hair all over®®, lets it slide a good 
bit downward (and) shakes it violently. As often as she shakes it, 
drizzling rain falls.“ Asiaq exclaims: “Last night he too made 
water.” (6) — Her great husband, who makes water — that is what she 
is shaking off (the skin). — “Ay, ay,” we say (when it drizzles), “Ном 
busy she has been, shaking it!’ Asiaq is wont to whisper: ‘tsyp, 
tsyp’ las when you hear water dripping]. “Last night, too, he made 
water.’ 7 By shaking (the skin) so often, as too much snow has 
fallen on the ground, it will begin to drizzle heavily. 8%) 
The Aperqiteeq, when the flying one (the angakok) departs, his 
spirit follows him (Aperqiteeq). Moving away, away, away, in the dark 
of the night <”, (finally) at day-break they (the angakok and his spirits) 
come home. Then these here (the people about him) talk of it:40 — 
“They are wont to journey (up) to them to cause water to be made. 
These [the narrator shows his five fingers] (five) days, when they have 
passed,“ (then) it begins to rain hard.” 
Once some perished in a great famine, as much too much snow 
had fallen. (Then) it began to rain in torrents, (the water) oozed through 
their roofs (?) *“) While all these began to starve, it rained, rained, 
rained.“ When the moon (i. e. the month) was at an end the snow 
began to disappear, it (the moon) gave the ice surface-water,“ it be- 
gan to clear off, people again began to bring in* both great bearded 
seals, fjord seals and bears. 45) 
By their frequent flights they (the angakkut) rescue the fellow- 
human beings belonging to them, because they can make Asiaq let 
down water. W Their countrymen says about them: “The great 
angakut — thanks be for them! Thanks be for him there*, because 
he became an angakok!“” If thou hadst not been an angakok, we 
might nearly have starved to death. The fact that thou art a great 
angakok will cause us to be rescued !”’ — Then they were rescued. 
If he had not been angakok they would have perished. Now it ends. 
= katak.—** (15) {imerserqita ‘something belonging to the midmost part of it’ 
possibly indicates a recess or niche as her depository.—*(7 This must already, 
of necessity, refer to a bag or sack as the content shows and it is named in 
what immediately follows: im'ik:ami. — In Holm’s text of this myth, instead 
of a sack, а “kaiak skirt” (= ‘half-jacket’ see First Part р. 301, cf. fig. 2992—) is 
mentioned here, which seems rather unintelligible, for such an article is bottom- 
less. — *(21) nkuwog ‘bends his head.’— * (23) sila erga? Cf. Labr. erga, ‘bottom 
