In another of their gymnastic exercises they lie down on their stomachs, the arms bent so that the hands lie close together on the breast, palms turned downward. Then they have to jump forward without bending their body, using only their toes and hands. Some are said to be able to jump several feet in this manner.
[Note 4.]
[Page 582]. In the Report of the Hudson Bay Expedition of 1886, p. 16, Lieut. A. Gordon remarks that the same custom is reported from Port Burwell, near Cape Chidleigh, Labrador. He says: “There lived between the Cape and Aulatsivik a good Eskimo hunter whose native name is not given, but who was christened by our station men ’Old Wicked.’ He was a passionate man and was continually threatening to do some bodily harm to the other more peaceably inclined natives. ***His arrogance and petty annoyances to the other natives became at length unbearable. It appears that these unfortunates held a meeting and decided that Old Wicked was a public nuisance which must be abated, and they therefore decreed that he should be shot, and shot he was accordingly one afternoon when he was busily engaged in repairing the ravages which a storm had made in his ‘igdlu’ or snow house. The executioner shot him in the back, killing him instantly. The murderer or executioner (one hardly knows to which title he is more justly entitled) then takes Old Wicked’s wives and all his children and agrees to keep them ***so that they shall be no burden on the company.”
The fact that the custom is found among tribes so widely separated will justify a description of those events which came under my own observation. There was a native of Padli by the name of Padlu. He had induced the wife of a Cumberland Sound native to desert her husband and follow him. The deserted husband, meditating revenge, cut off the upper part of the barrel of his gun so that he could conceal it under his jacket. He crossed the land and visited his friends in Padli, but before he could accomplish his intention of killing Padlu the latter shot him. When this news was reported in Qeqerten, the brother of the murdered man went to Padli to avenge the death of his brother; but he also was killed by Padlu. A third native of Cumberland Sound, who wished to avenge the death of his relatives, was also murdered by him. On account of all these outrages the natives wanted to get rid of Padlu, but yet they did not dare to attack him. When the pimain of the Akudnirmiut in Niaqonaujang learned of these events he started southward and asked every man in Padli whether Padlu should be killed. All agreed; so he went with the latter deer hunting in the upper part of Pangnirtung, northwest of Padli, and near the head of the fjord he shot Padlu in the back.
In another instance a man in Qeqerten had made himself odious. After it was agreed that he was a bad man an old man of Qeqerten, Pakaq, attacked him on board a Scottish whaler, but was prevented from killing him.
[Note 5.]
[Page 594]. The following performance was observed in Umanaqtuaq, on the southwestern coast of Cumberland Sound, in the winter of 1886-’87: An angakoq began his incantations in a hut after the lamps were lowered. Suddenly he jumped up and rushed out of the hut to where a mounted harpoon was standing. He threw himself upon the harpoon, which penetrated his breast and came out at the back. Three men followed him and holding the harpoon line led the angakoq, bleeding profusely, to all the huts of the village. When they arrived again at the first hut he pulled out the harpoon, lay down on the bed, and was put to sleep by the songs of another angakoq. When he awoke after a while he showed to the people that he was not hurt, although his clothing was torn and they had seen him bleeding.
Another angakoq performed a similar feat on the island Utussivik in the summer of 1887. He thrust a harpoon through his body and was led by about twenty-five men through the village. It is said that he imitated the movements and voice of a walrus while on the circuit.
Still another exhibition was witnessed by the whalers in the fall of 1886 in Umanaqtuaq. An angakoq stripped off his outer jacket and began his incantations while walking about in the village. When the men heard him, one after the other came out of his hut, each carrying his gun. After a while the angakoq descended to the beach; the men followed him, and suddenly fired a volley at him. The angakoq, of course, was not hurt, and then the women each gave him a cup of water, which he drank. Then he put on his jacket, and the performance was ended. The similarity of this performance with part of the festival which is described on [pp. 605 et seq.] is evident.