When their village has a whale feast, John and Susie share in the
celebration and dance. This is how the dance goes: A lot of people
hold a big walrus skin that has hand-holes cut around the edges. John
stands on the skin and they toss him into the air.
[Illustration: Dancers were sometimes tossed twenty feet up in the air.]
Higher and higher they toss him. He keeps his balance, lands on his
feet, over and over again, dances in the air and sings a song. At last
he tumbles off his feet, and it's someone else's turn. The dancer who
goes the highest is the winner.
John and Susie are proud of the way their mother and father can
dance--not only the old-time dances but new ones, too. Eskimos are just
as good at the white men's dances as the white men are themselves. And
they love singing just as much as ever. Now they sing the songs they
hear on the radio as well as their own songs.
The new world has brought many changes and many problems to the
Eskimos. To be sure, they have new inventions, but they have new
illnesses, too. Their old way of living is ended, and they haven't yet
found a good new way. But they are still The Laughing People.