of the rest, but all making their arrangements without the slightest disagreement or difference of opinion that we could ever discover. In all their movements they seem to be actuated by one simultaneous feeling that is truly admirable.
Superior as our arts, contrivances, and materials must unquestionably have appeared to them, and eager as they were to profit by this superiority, yet, contradictory as it may seem, they certainly looked upon us in many respects with profound contempt, maintaining that idea of self-sufficiency which has induced them, in common with the rest of their nation, to call themselves, by way of distinction, Innŭee, or mankind. One day, for instance, in securing some of the gear of a sledge, Okotook broke a part of it composed of a piece of our white line, and I shall never forget the contemptuous sneer with which he muttered in soliloquy the word “Kabloona!” in token of the inferiority of our materials to his own. It is happy, perhaps, when people possessing so few of the good things of this life can be thus contented with the little allotted them.
The men, though low in stature, are not wanting in muscular strength in proportion to their size, or in activity and hardiness. They are good and even quick walkers, and occasionally bear much bodily fatigue, wet, and cold, without appearing to suffer by it, much less to complain of it. Whatever labour they have gone through, and with whatever success in procuring game, no individual ever seems to arrogate to himself the credit of having done more than his neighbour for the general good. Nor do I conceive there is reason to doubt their personal courage, though they are too good-natured often to excite others to put that quality to the test. It
is true, they will recoil with horror at the tale of an Indian massacre, and probably cannot conceive what should induce one set of men deliberately and without provocation to murder another. War is not their trade; ferocity forms no part of the disposition of the Esquimaux. Whatever manly qualities they possess are exercised in a different way, and put to a far more worthy purpose. They are fishermen, and not warriors; but I cannot call that man a coward who, at the age of one-and-twenty, will attack a Polar bear single-handed, or fearlessly commit himself to floating masses of ice which the next puff of wind may drift for ever from the shore.
If, in short, they are deficient in some of the higher virtues, as they are called, of savage life, they are certainly free also from some of its blackest vices; and their want of brilliant qualities is fully compensated by those which, while they dazzle less, do more service to society and more honour to human nature. If, for instance, they have not the magnanimity which would enable them to endure without a murmur the most excruciating torture, neither have they the ferocious cruelty that incites a man to inflict that torture on a helpless fellow-creature. If their gratitude for favours be not lively nor lasting, neither is their resentment of injuries implacable, nor their hatred deadly. I do not say there are not exceptions to this rule, though we have never witnessed any; but it is assuredly not their general character.
When viewed more nearly in their domestic relations, the comparison will, I believe, be still more in their favour. It is here as a social being, as a husband and the father of a family, promoting within his own little sphere the benefit of that community in which
Providence has cast his lot, that the moral character of a savage is truly to be sought; and who can turn without horror from the Esquimaux, peaceably seated after a day of honest labour with his wife and children in their snow-built hut, to the self-willed and vindictive Indian, wantonly plunging his dagger into the bosom of the helpless woman whom nature bids him cherish and protect!
Of the few arts possessed by this simple people some account has already been given in the description of their various implements. As mechanics, they have little to boast when compared with other savages lying under equal disadvantages as to scantiness of tools and materials. As carpenters, they can scarf two pieces of wood together, secure them with pins of whalebone or ivory, fashion the timbers of a canoe, shoe a paddle, and rivet a scrap of iron into a spear or arrow head. Their principal tool is the knife (panna), and, considering the excellence of a great number which they possessed previous to our intercourse with them, the work they do is remarkably coarse and clumsy. Their very manner of holding and handling a knife is the most awkward that can be imagined. For the purpose of boring holes they have a drill and bow so exactly like our own that they need no further description, except that the end of the drill-handle, which our artists place against their breast, is rested by these people against a piece of wood or bone held in their mouths, and having a cavity fitted to receive it. With the use of the saw they were well acquainted, but had nothing of this kind in their possession better than a notched piece of iron. One or two small European axes were lashed to handles in a contrary direction to ours; that is, to be used like an adze, a form which, according to the observation
of a traveller well qualified to judge, savages in general prefer. It was said that these people steamed or boiled wood in order to bend it for fashioning the timbers of their canoes. As fishermen or seamen, they can put on a woolding or seizing with sufficient strength and security, and are acquainted with some of the most simple and serviceable knots in use among us. In all the arts, however, practised by the men, it is observable that the ingenuity lies in the principle, not in the execution. The experience of ages has led them to adopt the most efficacious methods, but their practice as handicrafts has gone no further than absolute necessity requires; they bestow little labour upon neatness or ornament.
In some of the few arts practised by the women there is much more dexterity displayed, particularly in that important branch of a housewife’s business, sewing, which even with their own clumsy needles of bone they perform with extraordinary neatness. They had, however, several steel needles of a three-cornered shape, which they kept in a very convenient case, consisting of a strip of leather passed through a hollow bone and having its ends remaining out, so that the needles which are stuck into it may be drawn in and out at pleasure. These cases were sometimes ornamented by cutting; and several thimbles of leather, one of which in sewing is worn on the first finger, are usually attached to it, together with a bunch of narrow spoons and other small articles liable to be lost. The thread they use is the sinew of the reindeer (tooktoo ĕwāllŏŏ), or, when they cannot procure this, the swallow-pipe of the neitiek. This may be split into threads of different sizes, according to the nature of their work, and is certainly a most admirable material. This, together with any other articles of a similar kind, they