unanimously rose in arms against them. Among other strange notions
entertained by the Greenlanders, they imagine that rain is occasioned by
the overflowing of reservoirs in the heavens; and they assert that, if
the banks of these reservoirs should burst, the sky would fall down. The
medical practice in this country is confined to a set of men who have
the appellation of "Angekoks," or conjurers.

When a Greenlander is at the point of death, his friends and relatives
array him in his best clothes and boots. They silently bewail him for an
hour, after which they prepare for his interment. The body, having been
sewed up in his best seal or deer-skin, is laid in the burying-place,
covered with a skin, and with green sods; and, over these, with heaps of
stones, to defend it from the attack of predaceous animals. Near the
place of interment, the survivors deposit the weapons of the deceased,
and the tools he daily used. With the women are deposited their knives
and sewing implements. The intention in so doing is, that the person
departed may not be without employment in the next world.

The Greenlanders are said to worship the sun, and to offer sacrifices to
an imaginary evil spirit, that he may not prevent their success in
hunting and fishing. They have a confused notion respecting the
immortality of the soul, and the existence of a future state; and they
believe that the spirits of deceased persons sometimes appear on the
earth, and hold communication with the "Angekoks," or conjurers, to whom
peculiar privileges and honours belong.

The traffic that is carried on among the Greenlanders is simple and
concise, and is wholly conducted by exchange or barter. These people
very rarely cheat or take undue advantage of one another; and it is
considered infamous to be guilty of theft. But they are said to glory in
over-reaching or robbing an European; as they consider this a proof of
superior talent and ingenuity.

Wherever a great assembly or rendezvous of Greenlanders takes place, as
at a dancing-match or any grand festival, there are always some persons
who expose their wares to view, and who publicly announce what goods
they want in exchange for them. The chief articles of traffic, with
Europeans, are fox and seal-skins, whale and seal-oil, whalebone, and
the horns of narwhals. For these, they receive, in exchange, iron points
for their spears, knives, saws, gimlets, chisels, needles, chests,
boxes, clothing, and utensils of