November.—The measures now adopted for the security of the ships and their stores, for the maintenance of economy, cleanliness, and health, and for the prosecution of the various observations and experiments, being principally the same as those already detailed in the preceding winter's narrative, I shall be readily excused for passing them over in silence.
The daily visits of the Esquimaux to the ships throughout the winter afforded, both to officers and men, a fund of constant variety and never-failing amusement, which no resources of our own could possibly have furnished. Our people were, however, too well aware of the advantage they derived from the schools not to be desirous of their re-establishment, which accordingly took place soon after our arrival at Igloolik; and they were glad to continue this as their evening occupation during the six succeeding months.
The year closed with the temperature of-42°, the mean of the month of December having been 27° 8', which, taken in connexion with that of November, led us to expect a severe winter.
About the middle of the month of December several of the Esquimaux had moved from the huts at Igloolik, some taking up their quarters on the ice at a considerable distance to the northwest, and the rest about a mile outside the summer station of the tents. At the close of the year from fifty to sixty individuals had thus decamped, their object being, like that of other savages on terra firma, to increase their means of subsistence by covering more ground; their movements were arranged so quietly that we seldom heard of their intentions till they were gone. At the new stations they lived entirely in huts of snow; and the northerly and easterly winds were considered by them most favourable for their fishing, as these served to bring in the loose ice, on which they principally kill the walruses.
Towards the latter end of January [1823], the accounts from the huts, as well from the Esquimaux as from our own people, concurred in stating that the number of the sick, as well as the seriousness of their complaints, was rapidly increasing there. We had, indeed, scarcely heard of the illness of a woman named Kei-m=o=o-seuk, who, it seemed, had lately miscarried, when an account arrived of her death. She was one of the two wives of Ooyarra, one of Captain Lyon's fellow-travellers in the summer, who buried her in the snow, about two hundred yards from the huts, placing slabs of the same perishable substance over the body, and cementing them by pouring a little water in the interstices. Such an interment was not likely to be a very secure one; and, accordingly, a few days after, the hungry dogs removed the snow and devoured the body.
Captain Lyon gave me the following account of the death and burial of another poor woman and her child:
"The mother, Poo-too-alook, was about thirty-five years of age, the child about three years—yet not weaned, and a female; there was also another daughter, Shega, about twelve or thirteen years of age, who, as well as her father, was a most attentive nurse. My hopes were but small, as far as concerned the mother; but the child was so patient that I hoped, from its docility, soon to accustom it to soups and nourishing food, as its only complaint was actual starvation. I screened off a portion of my cabin, and arranged some bedding for them, in the same manner as the Esquimaux do their own. Warm broth, dry bedding, and a comfortable cabin, did wonders before evening, and our medical men gave me great hopes. As an introduction to a system of cleanliness, and preparatory to washing the sick, who were in a most filthy state, I scrubbed Shega and her father from head to foot, and dressed them in new clothes. During the night I persuaded both mother and child, who were very restless, and constantly moaning, to take a few spoonfuls of soup. On the morning of the 24th the woman appeared considerably improved, and she both spoke and ate a little. As she was covered with so thick a coating of dirt that it could be taken off in scales, I obtained her assent to wash her face and hands a little before noon. The man and his daughter now came to my table to look at some things I had laid out to amuse them; and, after a few minutes, Shega lifted up the curtain to look at her mother, when she again let it fall, and tremblingly told us she was dead.
"The husband sighed heavily, the daughter burst into tears, and the poor little infant made the moment more distressing by calling in a plaintive tone on its mother, by whose side it was lying. I determined on burying the woman on shore, and the husband was much pleased at my promising that the body should be drawn on a sledge by men instead of dogs; for, to our horror, Takkeelikkeeta had told me that dogs had eaten part of Keimooseuk, and that, when he left the huts with his wife, one was devouring the body as he passed it.
"Takkeelikkeeta now prepared to dress the dead body, and, in the first place, stopped his nose with deer's hair and put on his gloves, seeming unwilling that his naked hand should come in contact with the corpse. I observed, in this occupation, his care that every article of dress should be as carefully placed as when his wife was living; and, having drawn the boots on the wrong legs, he pulled them off again and put them properly. This ceremony finished, the deceased was sewed up in a hammock, and, at the husband's urgent request, her face was left uncovered. An officer who was present at the time agreed with me in fancying that the man, from his words and actions, intimated a wish that the living child might be enclosed with its mother. We may have been mistaken, but there is an equal probability that we were right in our conjecture; for, according to Crantz and Egede, the Greenlanders were in the habit of burying their motherless infants, from a persuasion that they must otherwise starve to death, and also from being unable to bear the cries of the little ones while lingering for several days without sustenance; for no woman will give them any share of their milk, which they consider as the exclusive property of their own offspring. My dogs being carefully tied up at the man's request, a party of our people, accompanied by me, drew the body to the shore, where we made a grave, about a foot deep, being unable to get lower on account of the frozen earth. The body was placed on its back, at the husband's request, and he then stepped into the grave and cut all the stitches of the hammock, although without throwing it open, seeming to imply that the dead should be left unconfined. I laid a woman's knife by the side of the body, and we filled up the grave, over which we also piled a quantity of heavy stones, which no animal could remove. When all was done and we returned to the ship, the man lingered a few minutes behind us and repeated two or three sentences, as if addressing himself to his departed wife; he then silently followed. We found Shega quite composed, and attending her little sister, between whose eyebrows she had made a spot with soot, which I learned was because, being unweaned, it must certainly die. During the night my little charge called on its mother without intermission, yet the father slept as soundly until morning as if nothing had happened.
"All who saw my patient on the morning of the 25th gave me great hopes; she could swallow easily, and was even strong enough to turn or sit upright without assistance, and in the forenoon slept very soundly. At noon, the sister of the deceased, Ootooguak, with her husband and son, came to visit me. She had first gone to the Fury, and was laughing on deck, and, at her own request, was taken below, not caring to hurry herself to come to the house of mourning. Even when she came to the Hecla she was in high spirits, laughing and capering on deck as if nothing had happened; but, on being shown to my cabin, where Shega, having heard of her arrival, was sitting crying in readiness, she began with her niece to howl most wofully. I, however, put a stop to this ceremony, for such it certainly was, under the plea of disturbing the child. The arrival of a pot of smoking walrus-flesh soon brought smiles on all faces but that of Takkeelikkeeta, who refused food and sat sighing deeply; the others ate, chatted, and laughed as if nothing but eating was worth thinking of. Dinner being over, I received thanks for burying the woman in such a way that 'neither wolves, dogs, nor foxes could dig her up and eat her,' for all were full of the story of Keimooseuk, and even begged some of our officers to go to Igloolik and shoot the offending dogs. A young woman named Ablik, sister to Ooyarra, was induced, after much entreaty and a very large present of beads, to offer her breast to the sick child, but the poor little creature pushed it angrily away. Another woman was asked to do the same; but, although her child was half weaned, she flatly refused.