Language and Folklore. 467 
complaining voice): ‘Eh!” As he seized me (my arm), he became my 
future assistant spirit from the mountain cleft. * ©? 
All angakut serve their apprenticeship in these matters. Three 
days he treated me thus. Within the house I kept it secret, although 
I well knew that he had seized me as I leaned over backwards. I kept 
it secret because I so greatly desired to become an angakok.@® It is told 
that when women are fully trained angakut they can do all things, 
— fly through the air and ‘whistle’ (for their assistant spirits). @? 
And so I went up into the mountains to seek my whistled-for 
spirit, being in company with their horrors.® He (the spirit) hast- 
ened ahead up to the very high place (the high mountain ledge?), 
where, stationed in the intervening space (between two mountain sides 
or the edges of a cleft?) he swung back and forth, his hair waving 
wildly the while. © Then he bobbed up by this way (from the grave”), 
the whistling spirit, bloody-red all over (the face?).©® Quickly would 
I flee (but) that is impossible for us.* He (the spirit) ‘creeps into 
us’ (and) licks [or slashes?] us.» 
When now, it is told, he (the spirit) appears for the first time 
with his red face(?) on the surface of the platform, then the 
other people who are in the house exclaim for the first time: “There 
is someone whistling — it whistles, — it whistles! There is one about 
to become an angakok.” ©) — After he has been up a short time he 
disappears. We (angakut) generally regain our strength (we return to 
consciousness).%% I then exclaimed: “What was that! Before me was 
a dreadful sight(?).” — My comrade (housemate) said (whispering): 
“It was the whistling spirit, do not speak of it.” °°) — I kept it then still 
secret. The future angakut keep their plans secret. °°) 
Now I too began to be an angakok. The grave, the sinister grave, 
to it I went, (it lay) on the top of (the island) Qegertaalaq. % I ‘got 
sight of {?|’ the flat top-stone on the grave which was rocking viol- 
ently, the starting-point for the training of an angakok apprentice. (8) 
As I was about to approach it (to begin) I stopped in terror. (Each 
time I tried to go) It hought®”: “Why should I fear it? Am I con- 
tinually, for the present, not (able) to reach it?” — Then fear left 
me. Then I drew near the grave. When I came close to it the flat 
top-stone opened (and) he arose.“! Because he turned toward my 
shoulders I was not conscious of him. I first became conscious of 
him as he moved across these (my thighs). “?) Then he said: “I am 
strongly bound. The former human being, whom they had bound 
(wrapped up in the grave),* I drag (him) about with me.” Then he 
said: “Yes, yes, in a little while I shall become pliable” [?] 3) — Then 
these (the dead) turned away from me.“ At the same moment, of 
its own accord, the top-stone fell with a crash down again (and) 
now lay in its own place, rocking. “) 
Then I began to think: I am well on my way to become a 
finished angakok, (that is) because both my stepfather and my 
youngest brother were both great angakut, and knew everything 
without exception. 9 When the finished angakut make their appear- 
ance, about the hour when we are to go to bed, (we hear out) 
on the floor a voice with a slowly, vibrating tone, thus:) ‘o—oh ! * 
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