I asked him about his old rival Sipsu, who once gave me much trouble, and was an endless source of inconvenience to Kalutunah. He was dead. When asked how he died, he was a little loath to tell, but he finally said that he had been killed. He had become very unpopular, and was stabbed one night in a dark hut, and, bleeding from a mortal wound, had been dragged out and buried in the stones and snow, where the cold and the hurt together soon terminated as well his life as his mischief.
Death had made fearful ravages among his people since I had seen them five years before, and he complained bitterly of the hardships of the last winter, in consequence of a great deficiency of dogs, the same distemper which swept mine off having attacked those of his people. Indeed, the disease appears to have been universal throughout the entire length of Greenland. But notwithstanding this poverty, he undertook to supply me with some animals, in return for which I was to make liberal presents; and, as a proof of his sincerity, he offered me two of the four which composed his present team. From Tattarat I afterwards purchased one of his three, and for a fine knife I obtained the fourth one of that hunter's team, the property of Myouk, and the only dog that he possessed.
A PRIMITIVE TREATY.
The hunters were all well pleased with their bargains, for they went away rich in iron, knives, and needles,—wealth to them more valuable than would have been all the vast piles of treasure with which the Inca Atahuallpa sought to satisfy the rapacious Pizarro, or the lacs of rupees with which the luckless Rajah Nuncomar strove to free himself from the clutches of the remorseless Hastings. And we had made a treaty of peace and friendship, and had ratified it by a solemn promise, befitting a Nalegak and a Nalegaksoak. The Nalegak was to furnish the Nalegaksoak with dogs, and the Nalegaksoak was to pay for them. This exceedingly simple treaty may at first strike the reader with surprise; but I feel sure that that surprise will vanish when he recalls the memorable historical parallel of Burgoyne and his Hessians.
OBTAINING DOGS.
I did not tell Kalutunah that I wished only to bestow benefits upon his people, for no one is more quick to penetrate the hollowness of such declarations than the "untutored savage." He is not so easily hoaxed with philanthropic sentiment as is generally supposed, and he fully recognizes the practical features of being expected to return a quid pro quo. But I did venture upon a little harmless imposition of another sort, giving him to understand that it was useless for the Esquimaux to attempt to deceive me, as I could read not only their acts but their thoughts as well; and, in proof of my powers, I performed before him some simple sleight-of-hand tricks, and after turning up a card with much gravity told him exactly what (it was not much of a venture) Ootinah and his wooden-legged companion had stolen. He was much astonished, said that I was quite right about the stealing, for he had seen the stolen articles himself, and evidently thought me a wonderful magician. He owned to me that he did something in the jugglery business himself; but when I asked him about his journeys to the bottom of the sea, in his Angekok capacity, to break the spell by which the evil spirit Torngak holds within her anger the walrus and seal, in the days of famine, he very adroitly changed the subject, and began to describe a recent bear-hunt which appeared to amuse him greatly. The wounded animal broke away from the dogs, and, making a dive at one of the hunters, knocked the wind out of the unhappy man with a blow of his fore-paw. Kalutunah laughed heartily while relating the story, and seemed to think it a capital joke.
Our savage guests remained with us a few days, and then set out for their homes, declaring their intention to come speedily back and bring more of the tribe and dogs. I drove out with them a few miles, and we parted on the ice. When about a mile away, I observed Myouk jump from the sledge to pick up something which he had dropped. No doubt rejoiced to be rid of this extra load on his rickety sledge, Tattarat whipped up his team, and the last I saw of poor Myouk he was running on, struggling manfully to catch up; but, notwithstanding all his efforts, he was falling behind, and it is not unlikely that he was suffered to walk all the way to Iteplik.
AN ARCTIC MICAWBER.
DOMESTIC FELICITY.
This Myouk was the same droll creature that he was when I knew him formerly,—a sort of Arctic Micawber, everlastingly waiting for something to turn up which never did turn up; and, with much cheerfulness, hoping for good luck which never came. He recited to me all of his hardships and misfortunes. His sledge was all broken to pieces, and he could not mend it; his dogs were all dead except the one he sold to me; he had stuck his harpoon into a walrus, and the line had parted, and the walrus carried it away; he had lost his lance, and altogether his affairs were in a very lamentable state. His family were in great distress, as he could not catch any thing for them to eat, and so they had gone to Tattarat's hut. Tattarat was a poor hunter, and he made a terrible grimace, which told how great was his contempt for that doughty individual. So now he proposed, as soon as he got home, to try Kalutunah. To be sure, Kalutunah's establishment was pretty well filled already, there being not less than three families quartered there; but still, he thought there was room for one family more. At all events, he should try it. And now would not the Nalegaksoak,—the big chief who was so rich and so mighty, be good enough to give him so many presents that he would go back and make everybody envious? Human nature is the same in the Arctic as in the Temperate zone; and, gratified with this discovery, I fairly loaded the rogue down with riches, and sent him away rejoicing. But this wife, what of her? "Oh, she's lazy and will not do any thing, and made me come all this long journey to get her some needles which she won't use, and a knife which she has no use for; and now when I go back without any dog, won't I catch it!"—and he caught hold of his tongue and pulled it as far out of his mouth as he could get it, trying in this graphic manner to illustrate the length of that aggressive organ in the wife of his bosom. "But," added this savage Benedict, "she has a ragged coat, so full of holes that she cannot go out of the hut without fear of freezing; and if she scolds me too much I won't give her any of these needles, and I won't catch her any foxes to make a new one;"—but it was easy to see that the needles would not be long withheld, and that the foxes would be caught when he was told to catch them. And so pitying his domestic misfortunes, I added some presents for this amiable creature of the ragged coat; and when he told me that she had presented him with an heir to the Myouk miseries, I added something for that, too. This little hopeful, he informed me, was already being weaned from its natural and maternal supplies, and was exhibiting great aptitude for blubber. He had called it Dak-ta-gee, which was the nearest that he could come to pronouncing Doctor Kane.