Fort Eskimo, in 68° 30′ N., on Anderson River, was the most northerly of the Hudson Bay posts, and its factor, MacFarlane, saw with surprise the arrival of this young French priest with the alert bearing and splendid confidence of his twenty-five years. It must be a matter of life or death that brought him. What was his mission? The factor could scarcely trust his ears when he heard that the object was a missionary visit to Liverpool Bay.
MacFarlane told him that the country was so wild that Fort Eskimo was palisaded, flanked with bastions, and loop-holed for rifle-fire, owing to the desperate character of the surrounding and hostile tribes. Meanwhile four Eskimos had come to the fort from Liverpool Bay, including In-no-ra-na-na, called Powder Horn by the traders. The priest had hoped to meet this native, whom the factor said was known to be the greatest scapegrace on the arctic coast. Learning that Petitot was unfamiliar with the Inuit language, and was travelling unarmed, his anxiety increased and he told him that a journey into this unknown country with this savage brute would prove fatal. It was pointed out in vain that the Eskimos were bandits and outcasts—true pirates who, glorying in theft, violence, and fraud, viewed their unbridled passions as so many human virtues that showed the true man (Inuit).[21]
The pen portrait of In-no-ra-na-na, whom the missionary had chosen as his guide, is worth reproduction as a type of Eskimo dandy no longer seen. "He was a handsome man, well made, of large size, good presence, fine face, and had a nearly white complexion. He wore an elegant suit of reindeer-skin, its hair outside, stylishly cut and made. It can be compared only to the costume of our ancestors in the time of Henry IV. The close coat, old French breeches, and tightly fitting boots were of a beautiful brown skin of the summer coat of the deer bordered with a triple trimming of sea-otter, white wolf, and of the caribou, whose long reddish hairs surrounded his figure like a flaming aureole. Similar fringes around his arms and his legs set them off as by so many phylacteries. A head-dress hollowed out of the scowling head of a wolf surrounded his naked and closely shaven skull, which the Inuit could, if needful, partly cover with a small hood made of the head of a reindeer on which still remained the ears and budding horns of the animal." The usual labrets (ornaments inserted through slits made in the cheeks) of walrus ivory protruded from the great gashes in his face and hideously completed his dress.
As nothing could shake the priest's resolution, Factor MacFarlane decided to send as a companion a baptized Loucheux Indian, Sida-Jan, usually known as General Bottom, who spoke a little Inuit. He would save the situation and maintain the missionary's dignity by acting as his cook, dog driver, and camp servant. Moreover, as the brutal, powerful In-no-ra-na-na was actually going north the factor bribed him by giving goods to the amount of twenty beaver-skins[22] to guard the priest from insult or injury at the hands of his fellow-savages. Thus having done his best MacFarlane cried out, as the whip cracked and the dogs jumped to their traces, "May God protect your days among the bad people."
Eskimo fashion, they ran over the crisp, crackling snow in single file, the leader I-you-ma-tou-nak (the itchy) breaking the trail, followed by the great chief In-no-ra-na-na (Powder Horn), Sida-Jan (Bottom), and Petitot. When asked why they always thus marched in single file the Inuits answered: "The best-fitted leads and the others form the tail. It is the order of the ducks and cranes who plough the air, of the reindeer in migration, and of the buffalo or musk-oxen changing their pasture-grounds."
The calm cold was not felt, though the mercury was frozen, until the leader stopped short on the middle ice of the frozen Anderson, over which their route lay, and began to unload his sledge while the others were busy cutting through the snow for water. Petitot had a Hudson Bay sledge with steel-clad, smooth bottom, while the native sledges ran on two rough, solid side runners of wood. These runners drag fearfully when not shod with ice, which coating usually wears off in a few hours of land travel. So throughout the day, from time to time the Eskimo sledge was turned upside down, and its ice runners renewed by frequent wettings of the injured surfaces, the water freezing as it was applied.
As they were about camping the first night they met two young Inuits who had a stone lamp and fresh whale blubber—essentials for a warm meal—so the two parties joined forces to build a snow hut. Warned by the factor not to endanger his life or impair his dignity by working with his hands, the poor priest nearly froze as the house was reared, his undergarments, damp with the perspiration of travel, chilling his body bitterly. He tells us how deftly two of the natives carved from the snow-drifts on the river wedge-shaped slabs. The builder skilfully laid the blocks in spiral fashion, slicing them to fit and matching them quite closely with his snow-knife. The master-workman sprinkled with water the rising walls, which when finished formed a dome-like structure of dazzling whiteness, though hermetically sealed. Then with a few strokes of the snow-knife a door-way was carved out and to the windward of it was built a circular snow wall. Meanwhile an Eskimo built of snow inside the hut the customary divan—a raised shelf where the natives sleep—whereon were arranged the bear and reindeer skins for bedding. Close by the door was suspended the black pot-stone lamp, and directly opposite was placed the proverbial chamber-pot—always present in the Inuit huts.
After being brushed for the twentieth time with the reindeer wisp, to remove every particle of snow from his fur garments, Petitot seated himself in a corner of the divan, a place of honor. When all the Inuits were within the hut they carefully drew up the circular snow wall to the very door-way and poured water over the crevices. When it froze the six travellers were in a hermetically sealed snow house, there being no window or other opening through which a breath of wind could come.
The missionary's sufferings were intense that first night of arctic travel. Smoky soot from the dirty lamp and the nauseous effluvia from his unkempt bed-fellows were bad enough, but the excessive heat and impure air became quite unendurable. The outside cold was about eighty degrees below freezing, while the inside temperature was about eighty degrees above, so that the inner snow-blocks sweat freely, the globules of water forming on the surface ready to shower down on them at the slightest shock.