The People of the Polar North/Chapter 3
AMONG the Smith Sound Eskimos I met with some members of a foreign Eskimo tribe who had emigrated to the Cape York district, probably from the country round Baffinsland, a good fifty years before. They had become quite merged into the Cape York tribe, through wife-changing and intermarriage. They were generally taller than the Greenlanders, and of markedly Indian type.
Three or four of the actual immigrants are still living. One of these, old Merqusâq, gave me the following details of the journey. This is probably the only example we have come in contact with among the Eskimos, of any of them, without any external influence from civilisation having been brought to bear, and with only their own primitive means to assist them, having undertaken an actual tribal migration, a journey lasting several years, from one Polar region to another. And the information which I gathered from those who had taken part in the expedition throws light over the manner in which all the tribal migrations among the Eskimos must have been carried out in former times.
I shall, in the following, keep to Merqusâq's own account. His personal history is a living illustration of the existence the Eskimos must have led in the days when generation after generation grew up and died on their travels.
Merqusâq's mother gave birth to him on the ice during a winter journey; where, he does not know, further than that it was at some place on the other side of the sea. He was born on a journey, and all his life has been spent journeying. Although old now, and somewhat bowed from rheumatism, he continues his journeys of several hundred miles a year, on arduous fishing and hunting expeditions, and he says he will not stop till his soul leaves this earth and journeys up to the great hunting-grounds of heaven.
Over on the other side of the sea there lived many Inuit (Eskimos), he said, and his parents belonged to the most northerly dwelling of them. They had no white men living among them, but occasionally their country was touched at by large ships. White men on these ships had once told them that there were many Inuit far, far away on the other side of the Great Sea. This announcement had made a great impression upon Qitdlarssuaq.
"Qitdlarssuaq was the greatest magician in the tribe, and many legends were told concerning him. Shall we not hear a little about him first, before I tell about our great journey? Thou, Panigpak, knowest so many things about him. He was thy grandfather, was he not?"
Merqusâq and I were paying a visit to Panigpak. Panigpak was the son of an immigrant, Itsukusuk, and was a gentle man with a pair of unusually intelligent eyes. As a rule he was not very talkative, and generally sat smiling quietly at all that the others said without himself taking part in the conversation. But if one asked him anything, and the question interested him, there was always silence in the tent, while, with his slightly hesitating speech, he held his guests captive with his tales. Panigpak was a great hunter, and in every respect a man to whom all were ready to listen.
"Qitdlarssuaq," began Panigpak, "my mighty grandfather, the great man—yes, for the Inuit always obeyed him, for they were afraid of him—I saw him before he went away, when, as a little child, I had discovered my understanding, and had learnt to distinguish one person from another. I was fond of him because he used to put me on his knee and sing spirit songs to me. His hair was thin, like the white men's. His great forehead was not covered with hair. It would seem that I take after him in that. See!"
And he pointed to his hair, which was unusually thin.
"It was over on the other side of the sea that once upon a time he was with another, reindeer-hunting, and during the chase they came suddenly upon a broad road, up in the mountains. They began to follow it, and a storm came on that blew them forward, till they were obliged to run. The broad road led them to a house, a large house, such as the white men build. They went in. On the stone sleeping-place inside lounged two big women; and one of them began to talk, and pointed to the other.
"'She, there, is not of our race, said the one who was talking, and when she had said this Qitdlarssuaq's hunting companion felt himself powerfully drawn towards the strange woman, and he sprang up and lay down by her side, and the strange woman covered him up with her blanket. When they had lain there for a little, and the others lifted the blanket, there he lay dead by her side.
"'I wonder whether they will kill me too?' thought my grandfather.
"'No,' suddenly said the woman who had first spoken, even before my grandfather had revealed his thought. 'No, we dare do nothing to thee! Thou art fire!' she said. I do not know what that was supposed to mean. But it was as though she saw my grandfather's thoughts palpably before her, without his requiring to speak. So he thought it would be best for him to go, and the woman knew it without his needing to say it.
"'Wait a little,' she said, and took a large feather and fanned the breath of life into his dead hunting companion. And he came back to life again. And the woman placed food before them and said, 'Eat before you go!' And when they had eaten they went. And the moment they found themselves on the road again a storm rose once more and carried them with it till they were obliged to run.
"Then they saw a house and crept in to rest. And as they lay there, they were awakened by many men coming, and heard them jumping about on the roof.
"Then Qitdlarssuaq sprang out on the floor, and they heard only the cries of the fleeing men outside.
"Then they slept the night there, and next day travelled home.
"Another time Qitdlarssuaq was hunting with an orphan. They were bear-hunting. They drove a long way out to sea, and had lost sight of land; and while they were far out, suddenly there arose a gale that split the ice up into floating floes. Nowhere was there even one narrow bridge to the land. And the gale was driving them out to sea.
"'Lie down in the sledge and shut your eyes!' called out Qitdlarssuaq to the orphan. 'If you open them even once, we are both dead men.'
"And the orphan lay down in the sledge, and his eyelids were as if they had been glued together. And, as he lay there, he suddenly noticed that the sledge and the dogs were moving rapidly in towards land. And they were going along at a furious pace. Then the orphan grew curious, and raised his left eyelid just a very little. And behold! Qitdlarssuaq had turned himself into a bear, and he was trotting along, pursued by his own dogs, and wherever he trod, the sea became ice which bore the sledge and the dogs. All at once the one runner sank through the ice and the orphan was all but drowned, and he made haste, and no mistake, to shut his eyes again.
"Thus they drove on for a long time; then suddenly the dogs stopped.
"'Get up and look about you,' said Qitdlarssuaq, and he was standing in his own shape by the side of the sledge, on land.
"But when the boy looked out where they had driven, it was all foaming sea. So great a power had Qitdlarssuaq when he was a young man. But you, Merqusâq, do you tell what it was you wished to say. Or I could easily talk you to sleep with tales about the great man, my grandfather. And the sun is still high in the heavens!" concluded Panigpak.
"After Qitdlarssuaq had once heard that there were Inuit over on the other side of the sea, he could never settle down to anything again. He held great conjurations of spirits in the presence of all the people of the village. He made his soul take long journeys through the air, with his helping spirits, to look for the country of the strange Inuit. At last one day he informed his fellow-villagers that he had found the new country! And he told them that he was going to journey to the strange people, and he exhorted them all to follow him.
"'Do you know the desire for new countries? Do you know the desire to see new people?' he said to them.
"And nine sledges joined him at once, and ten sledges together they set out northward to find the new country that Qitdlarssuaq said he had seen on his soul-flight. There were men, women, and children, thirty-eight in all, who started. There were—
- Kutdloq.
- His wife Talikitsoq.
- Their daughter Kunuk.
- Their son Sarpineq.
- Apâpât.
- His wife Inûguk.
- Their daughter Inuk.
- Qingmigajuk.
- His wife Angileq.
- Ulaijuk.
- Inuk.
- Agpâpik.
- His wife Tapaitsiaq.
- Uvdlalaq.
- His wife Inûguk.
- His daughter Arnaviaq.
- Oqaitdlaq.
- Nateravik.
- Inûguk.
- The woman Ningiulaungat.
- Qatsôq.
- Arnarssuaq.
- Oqé.
- His wife Arnakutsuk.
- Mamarunaq.
- His wife Manik.
- Minik (afterwards the murderer).
- Piuaitsoq, his wife.
- Avôrtungiaq, their son.
- Qumangâpik, his wife.
- Patdloq, their daughter.
- Igtugsârssua.
- Merqusâq.
- Qitdlarssuaq.
- His wife Aipak.
- Mátâq.
- His wife Tuluarssuk.
- Their son Sitdluk.
"We started on our journey in the winter, after the light came, and set up our permanent camp in the spring, when the ice broke. There were plenty of animals for food on the way, seals, white whales, walruses, and bears. Long stretches of the coast along which we had to drive were not covered with ice, and so we were often obliged to make our way over huge glaciers. On our way we also came to bird rocks, where auks built, and to some eider-duck islands.
"As we carried all our belongings with us, clothes, tents, hunting and fishing implements, kayaks, we used very long narrow sledges." (He gave me the measure of the sledges, which were twenty feet long and four feet wide.) "We had to have our sledges so long because the kayaks were carried on them. We had fastened whalebone, or walrus tusks, to our runners. Whalebone in particular made extraordinarily light running, especially in the spring, when the sun began to warm the snow and ice. But the lightest of all to pull, under a sledge runner, is the thick skin of the walrus. But this does not hold on pack ice. We had as many as twenty dogs for our sledges, with traces of varying length. It is not wise to drive so many dogs in a row with traces all the same length; they prevent each other pulling properly, when the number exceeds twelve. The outer ones, too, will pull at too sharp an angle from the sledge, unless you have impossibly long reins; and reins too long would not be wise, because the weight is felt more, the farther the dogs are from the sledge. We did not have uprights on our sledges. When we had to descend a snow-covered glacier we lashed thongs round our tires, so that they should not run too easily, and fastened the thongs to the back part of the sledge, so that we could pull at them as we went down hill. On these sledges, besides our baggage, we could also drive our wives and children; and we could ride on them ourselves, too, when there was good going.
"At the season when the ice breaks up, we used to choose a good fishing-place and strike permanent camp, and there we hunted supplies for the winter with our kayaks. Towards the autumn we built stone houses, which we roofed with turf; in these houses we spent the dark season, until the light came again, and we were able to continue our journey.
"We had travelled thus for two winters, and neither year had we lacked food. Then it so happened that one of the oldest amongst us, old Oqé, grew homesick. He had long been grave and without words, then all at once he began to talk about whale-beef. He was homesick for his own country, and he wanted to eat whale-beef again. In our old country at home we used to catch many whales.
"After he had once started talking, he began to accuse old Qitdlarssuaq, who had been the leader all through the journey, of cheating. He said it was all lies that Qitdlarssuaq had told about the new country, and he invited them all to turn back.
"Then a great dissension arose between the old men. The travellers divided themselves up into those who held with Qitdlarssuaq and those who believed in Oqé, and meanwhile the two old men argued, each in support of his own assertion; Qitdlarssuaq said that Oqé was envious, because he was not the leader himself, and Oqé declared that Qitdlarssuaq was simply deceiving his fellow-countrymen in order to gain influence over them. The quarrel ended by five sledges turning back, while five went on. Twenty-four people turned back, and fourteen went on, and amongst these latter was Oqe's own son, Minik.
"This happened after two winterings.
"Qitdlarssuaq and the people who believed in his words then journeyed farther north. He assured them that it was not much farther to the new country, and encouraged them to hold out. He was always the first to break up camp, and he always drove the first sledge. He was stronger than the young men, and more enduring, although his hair was white. Those who drove after him declared that often, as they toiled along after dark, they saw a white flame burning above his head: so great was he in his might.
"Late in the spring we came to a place where the sea narrowed to a small channel. (Before this we had crossed two very broad inlets or fjords.) Here Qitdlarssuaq pitched camp and conjured spirits. His soul took an air-flight over the sea, while his body lay lifeless behind. When the incantation was over, he announced that it was here that we were to cross the sea. On the other side we should meet with people. And all obeyed him, for they knew that he understood the hidden things.
"So we crossed the sea, which was frozen over, and camped on the opposite coast. There we found houses, human habitations, but no people. They had left the place. But we understood then that we had very little farther to go before meeting with people, and a great joy filled us all; our veneration for the man who for years had led us towards the distant goal knew no bounds.
"It was decided that we should not seek further for the time being, but should first try to get in supplies, as the catch had for a long time been poor. The animals had been made invisible to us. And Qitdlarssuaq held an incantation to find out the reason of the failure of the fishery. After the incantation he announced that his daughter-in-law, Ivaloq, had had a miscarriage, but had kept the matter secret, to escape penance. That was why the animals had been invisible. And so he ordered his son to shut up his wife in a snow-hut as a punishment, after having first taken her furs from her. In the snow-hut she would either freeze to death or die of hunger. Before this came to pass, the animals would not allow themselves to become the prey of men.
"And they built a snow-hut at once and shut Ivaloq up in it. This Qitdlarssuaq did with his son's wife, whom he loved greatly; and he did it, that the innocent should not suffer for her fault.
"While we were there, there was a cry one day of 'Sledges! sledges!' And we saw two sledges approaching, sledges from a strange people. And they saw us and drove up to us.
"They were people of the tribe we had been looking for so long. The one man was called Arrutsak, the other Agîna, and their home was at a place called Pitoravik, not far from where we were encamped. We shouted aloud with joy; for now we had found new country, and new people. And our great magician had proved himself greater than all who had doubted him.
"Arrutsak was a man with a wooden leg. Once upon a time he had fallen from a bird rock, as we learnt later, and had had his one leg broken. His mother had cut off the injured part of the leg and made him a wooden leg which could be bound fast to the stump. He could run and drive just as well as if he had never lost a limb. But when we saw him come running up the first time with his wooden leg, many of us supposed that it was usual, and that the new people always had one leg made of wood.
"We sat down at once to eat with the new arrivals, and they told us many things about the people we were going to see. During the meal a thing happened that amused us all.
"It was customary in our tribe that, when eating together in a friendly way, all should eat from the same bone. When a piece of meat was handed to one, he just took a bite from it, and passed on the remainder to those with whom he was taking his meal. We call that Amerqatut. But every time that we handed the new arrivals a piece of meat, of which they were only intended to eat a mouthful, they ate the whole piece; and so it was a long time before we others could get anything to eat, as they were very hungry.
"That was a custom the new people were not acquainted with, but now they have all adopted it.
"After the meal all the men drove over to Pitoravik, to visit the new people, the women being fetched only later. But during the jubilation of the meeting, Itsukusuk released his wife Ivaloq from the snow-hut in which she had been shut up, and thus saved her life. No one said anything, for they were all thinking only of their great joy. It was a long time before Ivaloq recovered. She had no flesh at all left, and was terribly exhausted.
"Thus it was that Qitdlarssuaq led us all to new countries and new people.
"We taught these people many things. We showed them how to build snow-huts with long tunnel passages and an entrance from below. When you build snow-huts that way, there comes no draught into the room where you sit. The people here did build snow-huts before we came, but knew nothing of an entrance from below.
"We taught them to shoot with bow and arrows. Before our arrival they did not hunt the many reindeer that are in their country. If by any chance they got an animal, they did not even dare to eat it, being afraid that they might die, but they fed their dogs with it.
"We taught them to spear salmon in the streams. There were a great many salmon in the country, but they did not know the implement that you spear them with.
"And we taught them to build kayaks, and to hunt and catch from kayaks. Before that they had only hunted on the ice, and had been obliged during the spring to catch as many seals, walruses, and narwhals as they would want for the summer, when the ice had gone. They generally went for the summer to the islands where the eider duck hatched, or near razorbill rocks, as here at Agpat, or inland, or to a country where the Little Auks bred. They told us that their forefathers had known the use of the kayak, but that an evil disease had once ravaged their land, and carried off the old people. The young ones did not know how to build new kayaks, and the old people's kayaks they had buried with their owners. This was how it had come about that kayak hunting had been forgotten.
"All the people took us in as kinsmen, and we stayed here many years without thinking of returning home. But it came to pass that old Qitdlarssuaq was again taken with the desire for a long journey. He was very old then, with children and children's children. But he said that he wished to see his own country again before he died. And he announced that he was going to start back. He had been among the new people then for six years. All those who had followed him here were unwilling to desert him, and made ready to start back with him. Only his son, Itsukusuk, decided to remain, because he had a little child who was ill.
"I was a half-grown boy when I arrived here; then I had just taken a wife, and I decided at once to go back with the others. My brother, Qumangâpik, did the same.
"A man from the tribe here named Erè, with his wife and little child, now joined themselves to us who had grown anxious to return to our country. He thought he would like to see our land. And so we drove away.
"Qitdlarssuaq never saw his country again. He died during the first wintering. And after his death things went very ill with us all. During our second wintering we had not food supplies enough for the winter, and during the great darkness, famine broke out among us. We were near a large lake where we caught a few salmon. But it was not enough. Most of our travelling companions had bellies too large, and they began to starve.
"Qitdlarssuaq's wife, Agpâq, and my father and mother and Erè's, died of hunger. And those who were left, and who refused the salmon, began to eat the dead bodies. Minik and Mátâq were the worst. I saw them eat my father and my mother. I was too young and could not stop them. Then one day Minik flung himself upon me from behind, to kill me and eat me. But fortunately my brother came up just then, and Minik only had time to thrust out my one eye, after which he rushed out of the house. Then we saw him and Mátâq break into a neighbouring house and each take a dead body over his shoulders and flee up into the mountains. Before they disappeared, we heard them call down snow and snowstorms. That was so that their footprints might be covered up. And we never saw anything more of them.
"Then my brother, his wife, and his two children (one of his children had already died of hunger), and I and my wife left our dwelling and decided to turn back. We did not get far. It was the dark season, and a very great cold set in, and there was nothing to catch. On this journey my brother lost his wife, who went astray on a glacier, and did not return. We had to stay where we were and build snow-huts, and, as we had no food, we were obliged to eat our dogs. That left us of course without teams. And when we wanted to continue our journey, we were obliged to harness ourselves to our sledges and pull them.
"The fifth year after our departure with Qitdlarssuaq we arrived back again here, after having endured great hardships. It is a difficult matter to cover long distances when you have no teams, and it is difficult to procure food without dogs. But the man who spends his life travelling must often put up with ungentle conditions. I will finish by just telling you what happened to my brother Qumangâpik.
"He was married four times altogether, and, by the four marriages, had fifteen children. His first wife, Patdloq, went astray on a snow-covered glacier and froze to death; his second wife, Ivaloq, was buried under an avalanche, and frozen to death; his third wife, Nujaliaq, died of illness; and his fourth wife, Eqagssuaq, was frozen to death. Of his fifteen children, one was starved to death, four were frozen, and five died of illness. Qumangâpik himself was frozen to death during a snowstorm.
"I will tell you about his death.
"They were living the first part of the winter that year at Etâ, but when their meat was nearly at an end, and their blubber too, and they were in danger of being obliged to sit in their houses with lamps out—they were sixteen souls,—they 
"When the building was finished, he must suddenly have got very cold, drenched as he was with perspiration, and, as they had no blubber with which to light the lamp in the snow-hut, he was frozen to death, together with his wife and two little children. I can only think of that way in which the cold could have killed him. For he always used to be stronger than it.
"There were eleven who died.
"When the snowstorm was over, four were left alive, namely, Aleqa, Qaingaq, Pualuna, and Inoqusiaq. When they had eaten their dogs, they tried to make their way south to Serfalik, where I was living with my wife. But when they discovered how weak and tired they all were, they were obliged to leave Inoqusiaq behind, he being the most exhausted. They put a little dog's flesh in the hut for him, but it turned out later that soon after they had left him he had been frozen to death.
"Aleqa, a middle-aged woman, and Pualuna, her son of about twenty, were likewise quickly tired. And so Qaingaq was obliged to put them on a sledge and push them to Serfalik on it. So those three were saved. Afterwards I went up to look for those who had been frozen to death. I had thought of burying my brother and his family; but it proved impossible, as they were quite covered with snow, and fast frozen in drifts. Certainly here and there part of an arm or leg projected, but you could not get a whole body out without injury. I had no spade to dig them out with. They had died just at the edge of the ice.
"When the spring comes and the sun melts the ice, and the edge of the ice rushes down into the sea, they will go with it and find their grave. Yes, now I have told you of things I do not care to talk of. But what does not one do for a well-loved guest to one's country?
"When thou goest home to thy fellow-countrymen, thou canst tell them what thou hast just heard. Tell them that thou didst meet me, when I was still stronger than death. Thou seest that my own eye is blinded. Minik thrust it out for me, when he desired to satisfy his hunger with my flesh. Look at my body: it is covered with deep scars; those are the marks of bears' claws. Death has been near me many times,—my family are disappearing; I shall soon be the only one left; but as long as I can hold a walrus and kill a bear, I shall still be glad to live."