One day they had been out making snowballs, and stopped to shake the snow off their parkas before coming into the house. The Eskimo parka is a sort of middy blouse with a hood attached to it. In winter these parkas are usually made of reindeer skin, with a big ruff of fur around the edge of the hood to protect the face. The best fur to trim the hood is that of the wolverine, for it does not collect moisture from the breath.
The children stamped their feet and brushed the snow from each other with small flat ivory sticks shaped for that purpose. In doing this the boy broke the beautiful string of beads which the girl wore around her neck.
Now these were very precious beads; and the boy was afraid of his uncle, and did not like to tell what he had done, but he bravely took his little cousin by the hand and went into the house trembling with fear. Walking up to the chief he said, “Uncle, I am sorry but I broke the precious beads.”
His uncle was furious. “How did you do it?” he asked, and the boy told him.
“Now,” said the uncle, “I am going to kill you for that. Those beads were my sign of chief. Now you have broken the beads, the people will say I am no longer chief, and will make some one else chief instead of me. You will have to die.”
He took the boy out of the house and led him to the kasga. There were many people in the kasga, but he drove them all out; then he took off the little boy’s clothes, and went away, leaving him all alone to die of cold and hunger. That cruel uncle closed the door, putting heavy pieces of wood against it, so that the little fellow could not push it open, and then went up to the top of the kasga, where he took the skin cover off from the round window hole, to let the cold air in. After that he went away.
When left alone in the cold without any clothes on, the little fellow started to run quickly around and around on the floor to keep warm.
Now in that village lived a man and wife who were very sad because they had no children of their own. These two people loved the little ones very dearly, and were good to all the children in the village; and the children were very fond of them in return for all their kindness.
Long after the chief had gone away from the kasga, and the little boy had run about until he was too tired to run any more, and could no longer keep warm, that kind man who loved little children came on top of the hut, put his head through the window hole, and called, “Hello,” and the little boy answered, “Hello.”
The man said, “You are alive yet?” Then he put his head through the window hole and handed a bundle of things to the boy.