rnately, with a queer windmill sort of
movement.

"Twenty-seven of them," said Kit.

"Bareheaded, every mother's son of them!" exclaimed Weymouth.

"Only look at the long-haired mokes!" laughed Donovan.

"Why, they're black as Palmleaf!" cried Hobbs.

"Oh, no! not nearly so black," said Bonney. "Just a good square
dirt-color."

This last comparison was not far from correct. The Esquimaux are, as a
matter of fact, considerably darker than the red Indians of the United
States. They are not reddish: they are brown, to which grease and
dinginess add not a little. On they came till within fifty yards; when
all drew up on a sudden, and sat regarding us in something like
silence. Perhaps our bayonets, with the sunlight flashing on them, may
have filled them with a momentary suspicion of danger. Seeing this, we
waved our arms to them, beckoning them to approach. While examining
the relics of a past age,--the stone axes, arrow-heads, and maces,--I
have often pictured in fancy the barbarous habits, the wild visages,
and harsh accents, of prehistoric races,--races living away back at
the time when men were just rising above the brute. In the wild
semi-brutish shouts and gesticulations which followed our own gesture
of friendliness I seemed to hear and see these wild fancies
verified,--verified in a manner I had not supposed it possible to be
observed in this age. And yet here were primitive savages apparently,
not fifteen hundred miles in a direct course from our own enlightened
city of Boston, where, as we honestly believe, we have the cream (some
of it, at least) of the world's civilization. Reflect on this fact, ye
who think the whole earth almost ready for the reign of scientific
righteousness!

Such an unblessed discord! such a cry of pristine savagery! They came
darting up alongside, their great fat, flat, greasy faces, with their
little sharp black eyes, looking up to us full of confidence and
twinkling with expectation of good bargains.

During our voyage we had got out of our books quite a number of
Esquimaux words with their English meanings; but these fellows gabbled
so fast, so shockingly indistinct, and ran every thing together so,
that we could not gain the slightest idea of what they were saying,
further than by the word "_chymo_," which, as we had previously
learned, meant _trade_, or _barter_. But they had nothing with them to
trade off to us, save their _kayaks_, paddles, and harpoons.

"But let's get