these men would come and attack them, and so they decided to be beforehand with them.
"Armed with lances and harpoons they rushed up against them on foot. The ice round the ship was new and smooth, and so they bound the skin from the palate of seals round their feet, that they might not slip. The white men were taken by surprise, and, as they found it difficult to run on the smooth ice, it was an easy matter to overcome them. Thus the men from these parts avenged the deaths of many of their compatriots.
"After that they plundered the ship and shared the booty between them. One of them ran off with a box. When he got it home and opened it, what should there be in it but a beautiful laughing boy! He had most certainly been hidden there to save him from being killed.
"The man let the white boy grow up with his own little son, and the two grew very fond of each other. The white boy used to catch ravens for his foster-brother, and soon became very adroit. He would pretend to be a dog, crawl along the ground, and get so close to them that he could bring them down with stones.
"Every one was very fond of the strange boy, who grew up just like the children here, and learnt to catch seals as we do. They made him a shirt of seal bladder, that rendered him invisible to bears, so it was said.
"It is told that the boy grew homesick when he saw the sky turn red in an evening; then he began to talk of milk and the sweet dishes that he had been accustomed to in the white men's land, and after that he would grow silent.
"One day he went out, stayed out, and never came back. They looked for him everywhere, but could not even find his footprints.
"Up near Cape York, some of his clothing was found, and that was all: it was the seal-bladder shirt. So the old people supposed that his longing for home had grown so strong that he had flown through the air to the white men's land.
"That is what the old story tells. And it tells the truth, for you are strange, you white foreigners; one fine day you appear in our country, and as soon as we have learnt to care for you, you vanish, and we do not know where you go."
