landed in my cove. It chanced that old Skipper Sam Brewer caught sight
of 'em, and he recognized Bill Portland from t' old days. T' other
three was Tom Marling's brothers. All t' men had guns, and old Skipper
Sam guessed they was after Louis. So he sent off his lad Mose to run
out to t' cape and give he warning. Though why he should I can't say.
Louis just said, 'All right, I'll be ready for 'em, boy,' and started
right in loading his two big guns and his rifle. Then he fixed up t'
windows and barred t' door, and when Mose come away he could see Louis
moving round inside and swearing enough to frighten t' fish off t'
coast for t' whole summer. Mose waited round out of sight all day to
see what would happen. But nothing did, only before dark he saw the
four men making their campfire on the edge of the woods near Louis's
house. I reckon they knew he'd be ready and wanted to keep him
waiting. Anyway, they was there all next day.
"T' third morning I caught sight of some men loading a boat at Louis's
stage, so, being only a hobbledehoy then, I guessed they'd not take
much notice of me, and no more they did. They told me Louis had tried
to break away t' second night in t' dark, but they caught him and
carried his pack back for him, and what else they did to he I don't
rightly know. Anyhow, they loaded up their own boat and then Louis's
two boats with fish and twine, and everything else that were worth
taking and they could stow, not forgetting t' barrel of flour and t'
keg of molasses.
"Skipper Bill told me that t' Governor offered to make him t' captain
of a man-o'-war, just to stop t' law-breaking on the coast. But he
were a policeman instead because he felt ashamed to see t' laws broken
and villains like Louis go free. 'It's to teach you people on t' coast
to be good boys what brings us away from our homes so far in t'
fishing season.'
"They never stopped loading a minute all t' time, and as soon as ever
they were ready, and that wasn't long after it were light, away they
goes towing t' two boats behind, and giving it to her straight for t'
Labrador. 'Skipper Life,' Bill shouted, just after the anchor was up,
'if you sees Louis be sure and tell him to be good and say his
prayers, and when he is ready, not to forget his uncles in Labrador
and come over and settle down peaceful like.'
"No, Doctor, Louis never got so much as a match back, though he wrote
and wrote about it--and Louis were a good scholar, being well learnt
in France. All t' Government did was to offer Captain Fordland, who
fished t' big Jersey rooms across near Isle au Loup on Labrador,
another hundred dollars to bring back Skipper Bill with him in t'
fall. T' captain told his men that they could divide t' money if they
liked to catch old Portland out of hours.
"I 'lows it was more t' fun of hunting than anything else that started
'em, though two hundred dollars cash meant a nice bit in them times.
Soon there were half a dozen small crowds keeping an eye out for Bill.
There were no wires or mail steamers to carry news them days, and it
so happened that Bill fell right into t' trap. For Captain Fordland
did a bit o' trade, and Bill, being out of flour, come along to buy a
barrel. Half a dozen men soon had him and his boat as well. T' trouble
was where to keep him till they went home in t' fall, which was a full
two months anyhow.
"The crowd what took him got leave from Skipper Fordland to lock Bill
up in t' top storey of t' old Jersey brick store on the Island; and
'em fixed it like sailors so that not even Bill should get away. They
had to share t' expense of feeding and looking after he between 'em,
and though they didn't give he none too much it took quite a bit of
their wages--only a hundred dollars for the whole summer.
"Bill had been there nearly six weeks and all hands were thinking of
going home, when one day he told t' cook who brought up his food that
he was fair dying of doing nothing, and couldn't he give him some
work. Being an old sailor, he set Bill to making bread bags, and for a
few days he made a whole lot, and t' cook took it easy. All he gave
Bill was some canvas, a pocket-knife, and some needles and thread.
Bill, however, saved a lot of canvas out of them bags and made himself
a long rope of it. Then he just worked on, waiting for a real dark
night and an offshore wind, when he let hisself down through t'
window, swam off to t' best fishing bully Captain Fordland had, and
was out of sight before daylight.
"You may bet they was all mad, more especially t' captain, who swore
that t' crowd would have to pay for his good boat. What they said and
did to t' cook be scarcely fit for ears to hear. Anyhow, no one knowed
where Bill had gone, and none of that crowd ever saw him again. He
weren't very dear to memory either.
"T' next place us heard of him was on the West Coast. He brought with
him an Eskimo wife he called Nancy, who was very good at doctoring.
She could make poultices out of herbs and medicines out of t' woods,
and she would charm toothache and warts and such like, and could stop
bleeding by just tying green worsted round your left arm. She had a
haddock's fin-bone that never touched any boat that she used to lend
out for rheumatism. She did a lot o' good, they says, Doctor, and she
made a nice bit of money, too, so that old Bill had an easy time. But
he spent most of t' cash in liquor, and at last she wouldn't work any
more for he and he got beating her. One, day he come rowing down right
into Port Warfield, with she tied up in t' bottom of t' boat, and a
stone tied round her neck as well! It so happened that big Skipper
Weymouth came alongside and seed her.
"'What be you going to do wi' she?' he asked, he not being afraid as
most were. 'Why drown her, to be sure,' said Bill. 'I towed her behind
t' boat for a mile a week ago come Sunday to drive t' devil out of
her. But she ain't no good to me now, and so I reckon I'll get
another.'
"The skipper saw that Bill had liquor in him and was quarrelsome, and
feared that he'd just as likely as not upset t' boat--and drowned t'
woman would be sure enough with that stone round her neck. So he says,
'Drown her! Not on this coast and lobsters just setting in. She'd
spoil the catch all summer just to spite you.' Bill looked puzzled.
'You're right, sure enough, Skipper Alf. I'll have to do for she some
other way'--and round he goes and rows her home again.
"The people, howsomever, was real afraid, and letters went up to the
Government. No doubt Bill heard about it. But there were no place left
now for him to go safely, so he just drank and drank where he was, all
he could lay hands on; and when he couldn't get no more I guess he
must have gone mad. For he were found dead on t' floor of his house,
with a great big knife he had for hunting deer in his hand.
"Yes, his wife's alive to this day so far as us knows. Her son Bill
found a box of old silver dollars, Spanish and French, buried under t'
house Bill had on Labrador, the time he were trapped by Captain
Fordland's men. They were mostly about a hundred years old. I saw many
of them, but where they come from, or how he come by 'em, no one ever
knew. We heard, however, that they helped poor Nancy to get back to
her people again all right."
KAIACHOUOUK
The brief summer of Northern Labrador had passed, and the Eskimos
around the Hudson's Bay Post at Katatallik were busy preparing for the
approaching winter. The season previous, according to the accurate
notes of the Moravians, kept for over a hundred years, had been the
worst on record; and now again, as the long, cold, icy grip of winter
drew near, the prospect of supplies was menacingly poor. So the
Innuits, that cheerful and resourceful little race of the North who
wrest their living from so reluctant an environment, were putting
forth all their energies in a "preparedness" from whose example many a
civilized community might well have profited.
Their chief Kaiachououk, of upright character, and the courage born of
simplicity, was a familiar figure at the Hudson's Bay Post where my
friend Barlow was _facteur_ for so many years. His acquaintance with
the chieftain dated from an afternoon many years before, when he had
first seen him, steering his large oomiavik, or flat-bottomed boat, up
to the station, while his four lusty wives cheerily worked at the
sweeps with his eldest son--an almost regal procession. It was on that
same evening that he had told the _facteur_, after watching Mrs.
Barlow prepare the evening meal, "Ananaudlualakuk" ("She is much too
good for you"), and the frankness of his speech, far from seeming to
disparage his host, endeared the speaker all the more to that
hospitable and discerning person.
Kaiachououk possessed qualities which evoked the respect and
admiration of all with whom he came in contact. Very noticeable among
these was his affection for his family. To this day on the coast there
is a story told of him and his youngest wife. He had been camping on
their outside walrus-hunting station, and as was customary, he was
sometimes away two or three days at a time, having to take refuge on
one of the off-lying islands, if bad weather or the fickleness of
fortune involved longer distances to travel than he was able to
accomplish in a short winter's day. It was on his return from one of
these temporary absences that he was greeted with the news that his
youngest wife, Kajue, was very ill. One might have supposed that
having so generous a complement of that nature, the news would not
have afflicted him in the same degree as one less gifted. But exactly
the reverse proved to be the case. Kaiachououk was completely
prostrated; and when the girl died two days later, having failed to
make any rally in spite of all her husband's generous presents to
Angelok, he literally went out of his mind.
The Eskimo custom, still observed in the North, is to lay out the dead
in all their clothing, but with no other covering, on the rocky summit
of some projecting headland. The body thus placed on the surface of
the rocks is walled in with tall, flat stones standing on end, long,
narrow slits being left between them, so that air and light may freely
circulate, and the spirit of the departed may come and go at will and
keep watch on passing animals, whose spirits must serve the person in
the spirit land just as, when embodied, they paid tribute to the
needs and prowess of the dead. The top of the grave is also covered
with large, flat slabs; and in a small separate cache of similar
construction are stored all the personal belongings likely to be of
use. The spirits of these latter are set free, either by having holes
bored in them or some part of them broken or removed, so that thus
being rendered useless to the living, they suffer what in the Eskimo
mind corresponds to the death of inanimate objects.
Kaiachououk was so convinced of the reality of the spirit world, and
so heart-broken at his utter inability to bring back to life the one
he had loved so well, that now nothing would satisfy his mind but that
in order to continue the communion which had been so sweet to him on
earth, he should be treated exactly as his lost wife, and be
immediately buried alongside her on some point of vantage.
At first his followers were inclined to treat his injunctions as mere
vapourings, but they finally realized that the man was in deadly
earnest, and were eventually compelled to comply with his wishes. The
day being set, he was accordingly dressed in his finest garments, and,
his dead wife being duly caparisoned and walled in in the customary
manner, Kaiachououk, laid out on the rock beside her, was treated in
an exactly similar fashion. There was no apparent alteration of the
chief's attitude of mind as they proceeded with the walling up, and
the heavy slabs were already being laid over him when two of the
largest happened to become lodged on his chest. For a short time he
made no sign and offered no kind of resistance; but it was gradually
forced upon him that this method of translation into other worlds was
far from being as easy as he had been inclined to suppose.
Consequently, before the cortege had broken up and his last friends
departed, he was loudly appealing to them to return and release him.
He was never known afterwards to refer to the incident; but on the
whole it had an excellent effect on the Innuits; and they realized, so
far as their unimpressionable natures are capable of doing, the strong
domestic affection for his wife which was one of their chief's
pre-eminent sources of greatness.
On this particular fall, when the last drama in Kaiachououk's life was
played, when the northern lights sent their many-coloured banners
floating over the heavens, and the stars looked so large and shining
that it seemed one must surely touch them from the tops of the high
hills, he was camping with his family and two or three others on a
small ledge at the foot of the mighty Kiglapeit (shining top)
Mountains, hunting walrus. This year the hunt was doubly important to
them, and they delayed longer than was their wont. Here the great cape
with which the spur ends marks the division of the whole trend of the
land north from that which runs more directly south toward Katatallik.
There the whole force of the south-going polar streams, focused on the
ice, keeps open water long after all the rest of the coast is locked
in the grim grip of winter. The walrus herds seem, in the evolution of
ages, to have got an appreciation of this fact through their
adamantine skulls. Therefore, from time immemorial, it has been
chosen as a rendezvous of the Innuits in spring and fall. The chaos of
ancient walrus bones which strews the stony beach reminds one of
nothing so forcibly as the stacks of bleaching buffalo bones which
disgrace the prairies.
On several occasions during the year previous, Kalleligak (the
Capelin) had been guilty of the worst crime in the Eskimo calendar--on
several occasions he had failed to extend that hospitality to
strangers without which life on the coast is scarcely possible. It had
been brought to Kaiachououk's notice, and he had lost no time in
seeking out the man and taxing him with his remissness. A mixture of
traits like the colours in a variegated skein of worsted formed the
spectrum of Kalleligak's character; and selfishness, which fortunately
is rarer among the Eskimos than among those in keener competition with
civilization, was too often the prevailing colour. After the
interview, at which he had promised to mend his ways, he apparently
always lived in fear that sooner or later Kaiachououk would have him
punished, and even deprive him of some of his possessions. The
obsession haunted him as the thought of the crime does the murderer,
and at last impelled him to the act which, though it went unpunished
by men, blasted the remainder of his days.
Among the others who camped around Kaiachououk's igloo this year was
as usual the sub-chief Kalleligak. He had been more than usually
successful in his hunt, and was able to face the prospect of the
oncoming winter with optimism. On the other hand, his supposed enemy,
Kaiachououk, had been singularly unfortunate, largely owing to the
fact that his kayak had been left farther to the north. He showed no
signs of either impatience or jealousy, however, and never by word or
act gave evidence that he so much as remembered the rebuke he had been
forced to administer to the sub-chief. Finally he dispatched his
eldest sons, Bakshuak and Kommak, with a big team of dogs, to hurry
down north and bring the belated and forgotten boat back with all
speed.
Kalleligak, obsessed by his jealousy and chagrin, was able from his
camp to watch every movement of the chief's. He positively brooded so
much over the incident that he came to believe that his life was in
danger at Kaiachououk's hands. The next steps were easy, for he was
favoured both by the innocence of his superior and the weather. Days
are short in the late fall in the North, and darkness falls before
work is finished.
In the late afternoon, two days after Bakshuak and Kommak's departure,
while Kaiachououk was still out of his igloo and the darkness was
rapidly coming on, Kalleligak stole inside and took the chief's gun.
This he unloaded and then reloaded with two balls. Early next morning,
before the dawn, he crept out, carrying his own and the stolen weapon,
to watch his chance. Kaiachououk, emerging soon after from his snow
house, turned his back on Kalleligak's igloo while he stooped to make
a trifling repair on his own. Without a second's hesitation,
Kalleligak seized Kaiachououk's own gun, and crawling and crouching up
behind the five-foot snow ramparts which the Eskimos invariably build
around their winter houses, he fired two bullets through the
unsuspecting man's back and body. The chief fell head foremost, having
received two fatal wounds; but Kalleligak, throwing down one gun had
instantly grabbed the other, in order if necessary to finish the deed
before the mortally wounded man could tell who was responsible. But
Kaiachououk never moved, and his enemy slunk inside, believing that he
had been unobserved.
As fate would have it, Anatalik, another of the hunters, appeared at
the entrance of his igloo just in time to see the smoking gun-barrel
over the edge of the snow wall. Running to his fallen chief, he begged
him to tell him what had occurred. The dying man had only strength
left to whisper "Kiapevunga?" ("Who has killed me?"), and Anatalik
could barely discern from his eye that he understood the answer,
"Kalleligamut" ("It was Kalleligak who did it").
It was probably this, to us, unimportant item which caused a
confession ever to be made. Kalleligak, now convinced that the spirit
of his dead chief knew he was the murderer, believed it would haunt
him without mercy, and that his own life might be immediately forfeit
unless he could appease it. He therefore at once set about
preparations for a funeral befitting the dignity of the deceased;
which, in the absence of Kaiachououk's eldest son, he himself
personally supervised. When all was over he went to the igloo carrying
gifts, and offered to support the entire family till the sons should
be of an age to assume it. His overtures were as unwelcome as they
were importunate; but the poor women were forced to listen in silence.
Helpless as they were, with their young men away, they dared not anger
the man, whose character was only too well known. Kalleligak, in order
further to allay the anger of the spirit, with all speed set out on
the trail to meet the dead man's returning sons, and apprize them
personally of his version of the story.
Bakshuak, the eldest, listened in silence while Kalleligak first
recounted the long list of imaginary wrongs which he had suffered at
the hands of his father, then made his plea of self-defence, and
lastly recited the hateful overtures which he had made to the helpless
family, who were now, in spite of themselves, under very definite
obligations to the murderer.
Angrily the lad repudiated any parleying. The family would far rather
starve than be beholden to such infamy as was suggested. He was only a
boy now, he declared, but he said fearlessly that if no one else
killed him, he would do the deed himself as soon as he was big enough;
and he raced on with his dogs, to reach home and comfort his poor
mother. Had he but known it, he was really indebted for his life to
the supposed wrath of his father's spirit and the restraining effect
which it had on Kalleligak.
Eskimos never refer to painful events if they can help it. They go
even farther than certain modern "scientists," for if a person who
dies happens to have had the same name as one still living in the
vicinity, the latter incontinently changes his. As a result, confusion
not infrequently arises, for a man whom you have known all his life
as "John" is "William" the next time you meet him. Thus they avoid the
mention of the word the memory of which might bring pain to the
relatives. Much less would they bring bad news to a white man.
They took good care, however, that the local Innuits should know that
Kaiachououk was dead, hoping that they might give the great white man
at the post the sad news of the loss of his friend. Barlow, as soon as
he was certain of the main facts, at once dispatched messengers to
summon to him Kalleligak, and Anatalik, who had seen the deed. The
murderer had already expressed his willingness to surrender to the
white man, and he at once packed up and accompanied the couriers back
to Katatallik.
Meanwhile the news had also reached Ekkoulak, the sister of
Kaiachououk, and her husband, Semijak, immediately summoned his
council to discuss matters. All were agreed that the tribal custom
must be observed. "A life for a life" was the only law they
recognized, and the two elder sons of Semijak were selected to carry
the sentence into effect. Well armed and equipped, they started the
very next morning for the North. The following day they walked into
the Hudson's Bay Post to apprize the white man of their errand, so
that there might be no suspicion of their blood-guiltiness, not
knowing that by a strange whim of fortune Kalleligak and Anatalik were
already there and were seated in one room while they were being
received in another.
In the room with Kalleligak and Anatalik was Mr. Barlow's daughter, a
little child of six, who was amusing herself with a picture book of
the life of Christ. The little girl began to show the pictures to the
two men, telling them the story in their own tongue as she went along.
She at last came to the picture of Christ upon the Cross between the
two thieves. Mr. Barlow in the adjoining room heard Kalleligak ask the
child if she thought Jesus would forgive any one who had killed
another man, to which the little one replied, "Why, yes, if he were
really sorry and tried to be better."
The house of friends is neutral ground, and to start a quarrel in the
great white man's house would be about as likely as that we should
begin one on the steps of the altar. Thus, when Kalleligak and
Anatalik were summoned to dinner, both parties proceeded as if nothing
unusual were in the air and all refreshed themselves at the same
board.
Bidding them to keep the peace, Mr. Barlow made an effort to get to
the bottom of the affair; but he found it very hard to know what to
advise. The sister of Kaiachououk had begged and prayed her sons, now
chosen as avengers, to have nothing to do with the slaying, saying,
"It will only make more trouble. It will be Kalleligak's family who
will suffer. They will surely starve to death." She had even sent a
special messenger to the agent with an earnest plea that he would use
all his influence to save her lads from the shedding of blood.
Having decided that the matter should be settled in open court and to
abide by the decision of the great white man, all concerned now
adjourned to the kitchen, and not for the first time that humble room
was transformed into a court of justice. Kalleligak first gave his
version of the story without the slightest attempt to conceal
anything. He said he had lived in constant terror of what Kaiachououk
might inflict upon him; and then, turning to the two men, who were
fully armed with loaded guns, he said:--
"I know you have come to kill me. I shall never know good fortune
again, anyhow. I have many skins and goods. With those I will pay for
Kaiachououk. I can say no more."
As he ceased speaking, Semijak's eldest son burst out angrily:--
"Yes, we have come to kill you. Our law is a life for a life. We will
not take any bribe."
But Oggak, the second avenger, thought differently:--
"We will hurt those who are not guilty. It would be different if he
had no family. What offer does he make?"
"You know that Kalleligak is the second best hunter in the North," the
agent spoke up. "And your mother, the wife of Semijak, has also sent
me a letter. She says nothing but evil will come from killing the head
of another family. Cannot the spirit be satisfied in some other way?"
Mr. Barlow said he would go out and return when they had talked over
the matter among themselves. He always felt great pity for these
far-off outcasts of humanity. To kill another could only make matters
worse. It was quite probable that even a blood feud would be started
and more valuable lives be sacrificed. The struggle for existence was
hard enough in any case, and if he suggested their taking the law into
their own hands, there was no telling where it would end.
So it turned out that the matter was settled by simple word of mouth.
That was absolutely sufficient for Kalleligak. If the avengers
appointed by the tribe were satisfied, not only would the spirit of
the murdered chief rest quietly, but the guilty one's life would be
safe.
The agreement, duly drawn up by the agent, read as follows:--