been bought from them. The Esquimaux, of whom about one
hundred were present, then gave the brethren their hands, and solemnly
promised to abide by their agreement "as long as the sun shone."

After this sacred transaction the brethren, along with Mikak and her
family, returned to the ship, which set sail the same day for
Esquimaux Bay. On the dangerous passage, Mikak and her husband were of
essential service in directing their course among rocks and islands,
and likewise in trading with the Esquimaux they met with on their way,
and inducing them to receive the brethren favourably, and attend to
their instructions. Notwithstanding, however, the uniform expressions
of love with which the savages everywhere hailed them, the
missionaries found it necessary always to be upon their guard, and use
the utmost circumspection in their intercourse with their new friends,
especially on shipboard, where they behaved with a rude intrusion,
often extremely troublesome, and not always without showing marks of
their natural propensity to thieving; they therefore prohibited more
than five from coming on board at one time to trade, and that only
during the day; and informed them that if any were found in the ship
during the night, they should be treated as thieves; and, to fix the
time allowed for trading more exactly, a cannon was fired at six
o'clock in the morning, and another at the same time in the evening.
Finding that his regulations, however, were not so strictly observed
as he could wish, and the natives becoming rather troublesome, Captain
Mugford, while lying off the Island Amitok, deemed it necessary to
show them that he possessed the power of punishing their misdeeds if
he chose to employ it. He fired several shot from his great guns over
their heads against a high barren rock at no great distance. When the
broken pieces of the rock rolled down threateningly towards them, they
raised a mournful howl in their tents, as if they were about to be
destroyed; but they afterwards behaved more orderly, and not with the
savage wildness they had done before, yet the missionaries were always
obliged to act with firmness and decision, in order to prevent all
approaches to any transgression that it might have been necessary to
punish, or that might have exposed any of the men to danger.

During the voyage, Drachart held a meeting morning and evening, in the
cabin, with the young Esquimaux, who seemed to take great pleasure in
it, and we