SPORT AND HUNTING
A whole book could be written on Eskimo sport and on the Eskimo methods
of hunting generally. These methods are based, of course, on an
intimate knowledge and experience of the habits and characters of the
arctic birds and animals. Something has already been said in this
connection about seals and seal hunting. But a little space must now be
devoted to some account of a few more of these methods and adventures.
With the coming of March, the sealing season has set in. The days begin
to draw out, the sun climbs higher in the heavens, and even sheds a
faint warmth now on the lee side of shelter, if there be no movement in
the air. The seals are arriving in droves, and their young are being
born in their caves under the snow, all over the wide expanse of the
ice off shore.
A spirit of restlessness seizes upon the tribesfolk. The hunting
weapons are gladly brought out for examination and getting in
readiness; the small hunting sleds are put in order; the heavy winter
deerskin clothing is laid aside and the lighter garments of summer
sealskin put in thorough repair, to don as soon as the tribe shall be
ready to move off en masse to the sealing grounds. Mysterious meetings
take place between the Angakooeet and the chiefs, when the spring
campings are fully discussed and arranged among them.
At last the great day arrives when, with much shouting and bustle, the
sleds are loaded and the dogs harnessed. Each hunter and his wife
assemble and pack their belongings—the lamp, the cooking pot, the box
of small tools, the large knife for building (i.e., for cutting out
blocks of snow), spears, lines, spare skins for clothing, etc., etc.,
etc. The baby is popped into the mother’s hood; the boy takes up his
station by the team, to learn to drive and manage it, and with many a
shout, much touching of noses in farewell, cracking of whips, laughter
and joking, each outfit pulls out and drives away, off into the frozen
bay.
The old folk are left behind in the village, to await the end of the
season, to dress the skins brought in to them every now and again by
boys returning from the camps. Sealmeat abounds; everyone gorges to
Eskimo repletion and lives in luxury. The ground is covered with skins,
pegged out to dry in the sun, prior to being scraped, washed, and
prepared for making up.
The newly flensed hide is first freed from its inner layer of fat and
blubber, and this is rendered down for oil for the lamps. The fur is
then washed with warm water to remove the grease. Then small holes are
pierced all round the edge of the skin, and the whole is pegged out to
its full extent on a frame, or merely on the ground, to dry and sweeten
and bleach in the genial brightness of the arctic spring day. After
this process, the inner membrane is first pared off, and the skin is
ready to be tailored. Everyone left behind in the village on shore is
kept busy at this sort of work.
As the spring sealing season wears on towards the arctic summer, an
entire change comes over the activities of the tribesfolk. They have,
now, to prepare for the long trail inland to the feeding ground of the
deer. Stacks of provisions are accumulated, and the boats and kyaks got
ready for the trip to the head of the fiord, whence the expedition will
make its start. The framework of the umiaks is carefully examined, and
new pieces put in where required. All thongs and lashings are
strengthened or renewed; secondary skins in former times were prepared
as boat coverings, to be discarded when they became so waterlogged as
to check the pace. As a rule, one of these large travelling boats is
owned and shared by several families, and will contain the whole of
their effects.
At length these preparations are complete. The day comes when a general
packing up absorbs all the energies of the tribe. Tents are struck and
folded away at the bottom of the boat, together with big consignments
of sealskin buckets and hunting weapons. The women ship the ponderous
and unhandy oars, children and dogs pile in on top of everything, and
the men take up their travelling stations fore and aft, in readiness to
defend the transport from any sort of attack, or to launch a harpoon at
any likely prey.
They pull away joyously and hilariously on the great summer trip. As
often as the wind will allow they hoist the great square sail made of
seal intestine, and one member of the crew takes up a station beside it
with a water bucket, to keep it constantly wet. Otherwise it would dry,
and split into ribbons before the breeze. At the present day canvas
sails are used.
Every now and again, as they coast along among the islands, they put in
here or there for fresh supplies of drinking water. At night they fetch
some well-known point for an encampment. The umiaks are moored, heather
and driftwood collected, fires lit, kettles slung, and the evening stew
set to simmer, while the men forage afield for the next day’s
provender. Then, rolling themselves up in their blankets, the
travellers drop off to sleep right there on the ground, under the
shelter of whatever cover it may afford, to be up and under way again
before sunrise next morning.
The days pass very pleasantly. The scenery is grand, the weather clear
and sunny; the water, gemmed with islands dark brown and green, is
still as a mill-pond. The fleet of primitive, uncouth-looking skin
boats, filled with barbaric northern folk with tattooed faces and
guttural speech, reproduces a picture of pre-historic times. Many of
these scenes of Eskimo life and enterprise are deserving of record by
the best of artists, if only to bring before us in these effete days of
over-civilisation a vivid, still existent, picture of the very earliest
adventures of the human race.
At length the head of the inlet is reached. The boats proceed up river
at high tide to the appointed place of debarkation. Here the umiaks are
hauled well inshore, unloaded, dismantled, and turned over, to be
covered with a pile of stones against the time of the hunter’s return.
The personal treasures of the women are also hidden away in some safe
cavity among the rocks, and left there. Then the loads are carefully
apportioned all round, and made up in bundles according to the strength
of their carriers. The men bear the weapons and ammunition only and
travel light, in order to go on ahead and secure game on the trail.
Children are lightly loaded, and the old people carry nothing but their
own belongings; so that the bulk of the heavy transport falls on the
able-bodied women of the tribe. Each one toils along under tent poles
and coverings, piles of skins and meat, and the baby of the family into
the bargain. The whole staggering load is hoisted on to the woman’s
back and secured by lashings round the waist and a broad leather band
round the forehead. She is almost wholly eclipsed by the enormous
burden.
So they file off, one by one, from the point of landing, and make their
way to the uplands and the appointed general meeting place of all the
tribes engaged upon the annual hunt. Thither many such parties
converge: the people from Fox Channel, the tribe from the neighbourhood
of Kikkuktâkjuak, or Big Island, the Saddlebacks, the Noovingmeoot from
Frobisher Bay, and as many more from north, south, east and west. They
time themselves all to arrive as punctually as possible. The spot is a
high plateau among the hills, at the head of the inlet described above.
When at last all the tribes have assembled, the elders hold a general
meeting and decide upon the direction and the details of the
prospective hunt. As soon as this important business is settled the
people give themselves up en masse to a few days’ holiday-making.
It is the height of arctic summer; food abounds; and friends meet each
other once again after a year of separation. The people are care-free
and happy. No danger threatens from any direction. So that Eskimo good
spirits attain their highest pitch, and for a short time the people
abandon themselves to their every hospitable and sociable instinct, to
their love of jollity and fun, to sports all day, to singing,
entertainments, feasting and story-telling of an evening and well into
the night.
The sports are inter-tribal. There are running and wrestling matches,
too, races and competitions of all sorts. The youth are keenly aware of
being watched by the bright, sloe-eyed, laughing girls, and of being
criticised or applauded by the elders. As true a sporting spirit of
emulation, good temper and fair play obtains in this far-away arctic
festival as on the famous “playing fields of Eton,” and as many a
romance comes of it as well. For this is an immensely important social
and fashionable function among these primitive folk, and men and
maidens meet and strike many a match of their own.
There are contests with the bow and arrow. Poles are fixed in the
ground with skins suspended from them to represent deer and seals. The
vital spot, of course, is the Eskimo idea of the bull’s eye. The
spear-throwing competition calls for a high degree of skill. From the
top of a fixed, inclined pole, a line is carried to the earth, having
an ivory ring tied in it half way down. This ring is carefully
concealed by fringes of hide, and the spear throwers, stationed at a
recognised distance away, have to cast their weapons deftly through it.
The attempt demands the greatest accuracy of vision and training of the
hand. The contests are very keen, and great éclat awaits those who
distinguish themselves. Their names become household words round the
igloo lamps all during the succeeding winter, much as those of crack
footballers become familiar to the sporting manhood of this country.
In the evening come the singing contests—quite one of the most
important features of the annual festival. Ethnologists generally are
agreed that the Eskimo excel in poetry and music. Improvisation with
them is a recognised art. Every man is something of a composer, and is
called upon whenever festivities are in progress to contribute a number
of his own to the improvised concert. The form of these songs is quite
strict, and the melodies, even to unaccustomed European ears, may be
reduced to accepted notation. Travellers who have but a superficial
acquaintance with the arctic folk, distinguish little in the extempore
contests of the Kagge or of the Sedna ceremony but sheer barbaric
cacophony—yowlings, yells, and monotonous and seemingly endless
repetition. But there are some to whom Gregorian chant itself conveys
but little more!
These Eskimo songs deal with any and every subject which may occur to
the singer, those of a satirical or personal or topical character
proving the most popular. The contests give rise to untold amusement
and delight. Nothing is more appreciated in the whole round of the
programme. As a rule, the competitors are only men. The “ptarmigans”
(i.e., those born at the end of winter or beginning of spring)
challenge the “ducks” (or those born in the summer). Each side extols
its own prowess in hunting, its natal advantages, etc., etc., to the
detriment of the other. All sorts of ridicule is poured upon the
opposite party, causing the wildest merriment among the auditors, who
shriek with laughter at each successful or witty sally, clap their
hands, and vociferate over the comedian who wins the contest. The
Eskimo have a very lively sense of fun, and appreciate each home thrust
and happy skit every bit as keenly as a Cockney music-hall audience.
The Kagge, or singing house, of the summer deer-hunt is, like that of
the Sedna ceremony, a big round house, similarly tenanted by the people
in circles around the walls. The summer Kagge is built of sod and
stones. The women wear skin gloves—the backs black and the palms
white—and take their station behind everybody else, with the children.
The men come next, and the Angakooeet, as judges, sit in the front
circle. The centre of the house is left vacant for the performers.
The first part of the entertainment consists of songs describing the
exploits of the dead and gone heroes and hunters of the tribe, each
song having a refrain which is taken up by the women, who sway their
bodies from side to side as they sing, so raising and lowering their
arms as to show first a circle of waving white and then a circle of
waving black hands. Many of these songs are old-established favourites,
extemporised at first by some individual as his own contribution to
some occasion, which “caught on” and became part of the tribe’s
collective musical tradition.
After these come the extempore efforts of the current evening. Each man
contributes a song of his own, turning upon some event in his career,
or some more or less poetic fancy which has occurred to him. The songs
have probably been composed and polished, and possibly practised, in
private for some time, but the contest is the occasion of their
publication to the musical world. They are most attentively received,
and judged by the Angakooeet.
The outstanding event of the evening, to which all look forward on the
tip-toe of expectation, is the tournament of satires between the
ptarmigans and the ducks. A ball of thoroughly good-tempered musical
ridicule is tossed backwards and forwards between each pair of singers,
accompanied by roars of laughter from the auditors, who hold their
sides and roll in ecstasies of enjoyment. Tears of merriment stream
down the women’s faces.
This sort of thing goes on night after night for as long as a whole
week; and only at the end of that time does the gathering begin to
break up, and set about the prodigious business of getting on with the
summer’s work.
As soon as this interlude of festivity and recreation is concluded, the
tribes separate, each bound for its own appointed sphere of hunting
operations, independently of the others. The new camp is soon pitched
in some sheltered valley where there is a running stream, but not too
close to the selected district, for fear of alarming the shy quarry.
The men then go daily to search the hills and stalk the deer.
As soon as a herd is located, word is passed down to the camp, and the
women rally to the men’s assistance. As each arrives she receives her
instructions from the hunters. A valley is selected having but one
exit, where there seem to be plenty of boulders. The women station
themselves in a rough sort of ring all round it, hidden behind the
rocks, each one with her skin jacket off and slung over her arm.
Meanwhile, the men creep up, and, keeping also under cover, surround
the herd, and begin, by the well aimed throwing of first one stone,
then another, to drive it off in the direction of the selected ravine,
where other hunters are gathered in force with bows and arrows ready.
The deer, still suspecting nothing, move slowly to their fate.
Presently one woman, to the rear, and then another, gets up in the open
and beats her jacket on the rock behind which she had been hiding. This
scares the creatures forward in the right direction, and drives them
within the reach of the men. Directly they come within bowshot their
doom is sealed. So skilful are the hunters that no man expends more
than an arrow apiece on the deer. The whole herd is killed with the
greatest celerity.
The carcases are retrieved and skinned, and immense feasting follows.
These manœuvres are repeated day after day throughout the whole season,
until the snow begins to appear again on the higher ranges, and the
arctic summer is on the wane. Gradually the tribesfolk move off again
towards the lower grounds, the south, and the sea, transporting with
them huge bundles of invaluable skins and a great quantity of deer
hams, until one by one they reach the various points of water where
they left and stored their boats on the up-country trip.
There is no general point of assembly on the return journey. Each tribe
takes its own course and works its way back towards its own territory
unaccompanied by the others. The women and children get a brief spell
of rest when they reach the coast, while the men put in a few days seal
hunting, to provision the homeward voyage. Finally, the umiaks are
launched again and reloaded to the very gunwales; the sails are
hoisted, and the fleet draws away through the archipelagoes of the
coast to its port of registration!
Not infrequently on one of these big summer hunting expeditions, traces
are discovered of a winter deer hunting party which had been overtaken
by disaster. The evidences of some tragedy lie there for all to read:
the sled torn to pieces, weapons scattered about, small boxes lying
here and there, and bones—human, canine or vulpine—all over the place.
Hunger, perhaps, overtook the party; sickness followed. Wolves
attacked, or the hungry team of dogs got out of hand and tore down the
hunters, who were unable successfully to defend themselves. The writer
could instance many a savage incident of this description.
In a very similar district to the one described in the preceding
account of the summer hunting, there was a fiord leading up to a
landlocked bay, a favourite resort of the white whales. Regularly each
year the hunters of the tribes in the vicinity used to go to hunt these
creatures with gun and spear, taking splendid hauls of meat back to the
camp, and bales of stout hide to be made into thongs, harness, etc. So
much flesh and offal was left about on the scene of action that wolves
came to infest the entire region. In early spring the fiord afforded a
particularly good sealing ground, being so sheltered from the crashing
seas outside.
An Eskimo and his son ventured thither one day, intending to form a
camp there for awhile and put in some good hunting. Mile after mile was
covered, headland after headland passed, until they were nearing the
sealing grounds, when the dogs began to show signs of panic. They could
scarcely be got to proceed, no matter how sharply urged by voice and
whalehide whip. Nothing moving, however, caught the keen sight of the
men; no sound came to their ears. Suddenly, just as they passed another
point, a fierce howl rang out on the bitter air, followed by a chorus
of more howls, and a large pack of wolves swept out from behind it and
came into full view. They had been lying in wait until the sled came
up. Their bleached coats had rendered them invisible until they moved.
The hunters at once realised their deadly peril, and turning instantly
about, headed at top speed for home. A long fierce chase ensued. There
was no need to drive the dogs. They strained every terrified nerve in
their bodies and flew over the ice. The wolves rushed on behind. They
spread out fanwise, trying to encircle the dogs and cripple them one by
one as opportunity offered, by making brilliant forward dashes and
slashing with savage fangs at their legs.
The man thrust a sealing spear into the boy’s hands and shouted to him
to thrust it at any wolf attempting to attack at close quarters at side
or rear, while he himself, armed with the terrible dog whip, lashed out
continuously with the courage of despair, and the effectiveness of
years of practice. He roared, and swung the murderous thong over the
backs of the team, so as to protect it from the attacking wolves,
crippling any one of them who ventured within its sweep. As often as
one of the bloodthirsty brutes rushed in, it was met with a terrific
cut, and fell back howling and disabled.
Hour after hour the awful race went on; until at last, when it seemed
even to the hardy and seasoned hunter that neither he nor the wretched
dogs could sustain the strain a moment longer, they came in sight of
the last headland which hid the settlement from view. A final heroic
effort might yet bring them to safety!
With a yell of encouragement to the exhausted son, and renewed vigour
in his wielding of the whip, the hunter pressed on. The wolves,
realising that their prey was actually escaping, redoubled their
efforts to close in upon the sled. It dashed round the point only in
the nick of time. The dogs in camp beyond, scenting what was afoot,
instantly rushed out to give battle to the wolves. The pack, perceiving
that the odds were now heavily against them, snarled viciously, turned
coward tails, and vanished....
The refugees arrived in camp in a state of utter collapse. The man’s
whip arm was swollen beyond further usage, like his tongue, and his
voice had gone. He staggered to his house, and both he and the boy lay
there for days before either sufficiently recovered to rise and go
about their ordinary work again.
Many a party have been waylaid by wolves like this, and have not had
the good fortune to survive. Should there be a shortage of food,
resulting in subsequent sickness and weakness among the travellers or
hunters, they fall victims very easily to the rapacity of the savage
animal denizens of the wild. The male dogs of the teams get killed, and
the females join the marauding horde and revert to their wolfish state.
THE SONG OF THE PINTAILED DUCK.
As sung in Competition in the Kagge.
Samane samiyeyiya, iya, neakoa koololotingoâle
Sigoole kokiglotingoale aglokugle pooarkretingoagle
Okagle allotingoarkinna ikkoâto kettemalotikogikgoa
Ookeonne pissorayakattalale ipâ adyelikjolikpanma
Iya annungmenik ipa sosooktelaneyonele annamane
Adyegegaloâgoone kattargit nippotenekpategikkoa
Issungatoot annenarsuarâyakto.
Free Translation of the Song of the Pintailed Duck in Competition with
the Ptarmigan.
“His head is like a swollen thumb joint,
His beak is like the thumb nail.
His lower beak is like a shovel, and his tongue is like a spoon.
They come together (the Ptarmigans) in the winter;
They walk together, and make a soft sleeping place
By covering the hard rocks with dung.
But their breasts freeze hard down to this,
They flap their wings,
And try to fly away ...”
The singer goes through all the appropriate (if somewhat broad) actions
of this bit of burlesque, flapping his arms to ridicule the birds
caught fast on the rocks in their own frozen droppings. The Ptarmigan
is not slow to respond.
THE SONG OF THE HUNTER.
Panneyukpayiyeyâ â sakkokalemukkoa
Panneyuktarrekâ okeoksaktalimingmat
Samaniyiyeyeya â sakkokalemukkoa
Panneyuktarreka oonarramanna panneyaktarrega
Okeaksaktalemingmat sammiyiyeyiya â
Ipparramanna toosneksaktangmeta innarlo
Sângane samiyiyeyeya â oonaralelidlugolemanaeyâ
Iyuksaktareka innâlo sângane samiyiyeyiyâ â
Kinnalena imnarlo sângane.
Free Translation of the Song of the Hunter:
“He is preparing his hunting weapons and his ammunition.
Mine also are being prepared,
Because it is again autumn.
My spear is prepared, and my seal warp.
Because they catch the sound of my preparing,
Of my placing my spear,
In the front of the high cliffs
The seals have gone away.
Although the face of the high cliffs
Smells of the seals”
(Understood, yet they have gone away.)