bayonet, yet nothing was seen of his
countrymen. The next morning I accompanied him to the Esquimaux tent,
with an interpreter, under the idea that I might obtain some
interesting information; and was much pleased to find the family living
in the apparent exercise of social affection. The Esquimaux treated his
wife with kindness; she was seated in the circle who were smoking the
pipe, and there was a constant smile upon her countenance, so opposite
to that oppressed dejected look of the Indian women in general. I asked
the Esquimaux of his country: he said it was good, though there was
plenty of cold and snow; but that there was plenty of musk oxen and
deer; and the corpulency of the party suggested the idea that there was
seldom a want of food amongst them. I told him that mine was better, as
growing what made the biscuit, of which they were very fond, and that
there was much less cold, and that we saw the water much longer than
they did. Observing that the woman was tattooed, I asked him when these
marks were made, on the chin, particularly, and on the hands. His reply
was, when the girls were marriageable, and espoused to their husbands;
who had generally but one wife, though good hunters had sometimes two.
Wishing to know whether they ever abandoned the aged and the infirm to
perish like the Northern Indians, he said, never; assuring me that they
always dragged them on sledges with them in winter to the different
points where they had laid up provisions in the autumn, 'en cache;' and
that they took them in their canoes in summer till they died. Knowing
that some Indians west of the rocky mountains burn their dead, I asked
him if this custom prevailed with the Esquimaux, he said, no; and that
they always buried theirs. The name of this Esquimaux was
_Achshannook_, and as Augustus could write a little, which he had been
taught during the time he was with the expedition, I gave him my
pencil, that the other might see what I wished to teach the Esquimaux
children, as well as to read white man's book, which told us true of
the Great Spirit, whom the Esquimaux did not know, and how they were to
live and die happy. The woman immediately caught up her little girl
about five years of age, and holding her towards me manifested the
greatest delight, with Achshannook, at the wish I had expressed of
having the Esquimaux children taught to write and read the book. They
often pointed in the direction the others were coming, and gave