THE ESKIMO RACE

Evening Post, Volume CIX, Issue 5, 7 January 1930, Page 11

THE ESKIMO RACE

A DOOMED PEOPLE

ACTIVE AND FRIENDLY

STRANDED AVIATORS

(From "The Post's" Representative,)

VANCOUVEB, 11th December.

That the Eskimos have attained intelligence equal to the white man's standards is the conviction of members of Colonel Mac Alpine's mineral expedition who were. stranded for eightweeks on the shore of the Arctic Sea when their-'planes, lost in fog, landed, out of petrol. *

The marooned mining men fell in with Eskimos during tho first few days of/ their' enforced sojourn 200 miles from the nearest North-west Mounted Police post at Cambridge Bay. The natives displayed remarkablo sagacity in lpcating, on maps put before them, all the landmarks they were acquainted with- in their lengthy hunting forays. Yet they had never seen a map before.

Should mishap befall a lost prospector in the Arctic, the Eskimos will immediately assume responsibility for housing and feeding him. They have been taught by the police to cache food for human beings and dogs here, there, and everywhere on the trail in the summer, so that when the birds and caribou migrate, and fish can only be got through- the ice, there will still be plenty of dried fish, flesh and skins for food and clothing. Colonel MacAlpine's men frequently were amazed at the accuracy with which their native protectors located these food caches in all weathers, even where no landmarks apparently existed. , A "UNIQTTE WILL. A small settlement grew up around the marooned party. At one time there were five dog teams camped there. The geologists and mining engineers had many opportunities to study the family life of these denizens of the Arctic. No white man's ceremonial could have been more dignified than the probating, under the primaeval law of the Arctic, of the will of an old lady of the tribe who had recently died. An intelligent youth exhibited for the white men's benefit the will, which may be lodged one day in the British Museum as the strangest testamentary document of contemporary times. On a piece of blank paper were scrawled human figures, drawn quite intelligently, to identify the beneficiaries. Underneath each figure was a symbol, indicating the articles to go to each. Theoldest surviving lady of the tribe was l^ft the dead tribeswoman's hoard of cigarette butts The Eskimos swarmed .-over the white men's camp each day and reno J vated it in ways that would not occur to the superior race. The rapidity with which1 they erected igloos in daylight or darkness astonished engineers, who pronounced them wind and weatherproof and a marvel of construction, the blocks of snow being cut to correct size, without any fuss of measurement, and the centre pieces at the apes of the ; roof taking, the weight of the walls without strain. The floors were terraced, the higher bank, away from.the., door, being used for sleeping, the lower for cooking. From an apparently treeless landscape they produced fuel for the fire and willow bushes for beds. ■ALWAYS ON THE MOVE. Although they • reckoned not the time, these hardy Northern aborigines werCconstantly;on the move,.drawing supplies from their nearby caches, or hunting further' afield. Grandfather, a' skilled hunter,, stalked a lone caribou for days till he brought him down, and shared the flesh and skin with the whites. Meantime, the women sewed ground: squirrel skins for caps and moccasins for the travellers, against the time when the freeze-up came and they would take the trail for. Cambridge Bay. , An old Eskimo, his son-in-law, daughter and their child, an extraordinarily handsome little girl of five, mushed in during a blizzard. Within a few minutes they had thTee tents erected. The Whites were speechless with- astonishment. ; ■■■'..■- That the Eskimo has a sense of humour just as subtle as his rulers was demonstrated on one occasion to the latter's satisfaction. The marooned men were restless to get on, but with thousands of islands in the vicinity they realised the hopelessness of keeping the right direction in a storm without their guides. The Eskimos insisted that the freeze-up would not be complete for another few Pressed for the facts about the situation between the camp and the post, one of the Eskimo's remarked that the wind was breaking up the ice. Eskimos never cease smiling, .and the whites- did not know whether this was seriously meant as a warning. - A little later a young Eskimo returned to reassure the white men, and explained that, if the wind broke up . the ice; it would freeze solid again as soon as the storm abated. The colonel's party got no little amusement in the days that followed from the knowledge that a crude dweller of the Arctic regions, who had never been ','outside," could thus "pull their legs" so successfully." APTITUDE OF CHILD. The Eskimo child chose as a friend, out of the eight whites, the man whose task it was to write up the diary. Fascinated, she watched him writing, artl made more success than a white child of her age of her efforts to copy some characters he made for her. The natives brought them gifts from the storehouse of the Northland — everything from seal oil for lamps to whitefish, salmon, cod, and Arctic trout, . caught under the ice.' They showed how to light the shack with seal oil, bo means of a few strands of cotton laid across a small stone immersed in the oil in a cigarette tin! Graft and corruption have not yet extended their tentacles into the Arctic. In the "in-betwoen" season, after which 'planes must change pontoons to skis', of which ' the airmen -had' none, unsuccessful efforts were made to get. the Eskimos to lead Ihe party to Carn■bridge Bay. One native reiterated what another.had said —it was too dangerous. The whites offered to make him a present of a big Whaleboat if he ; would undertake the task. He refused. Next they tried a wealthy'young Eskimo couple—wealthy because, they possessed a hand sewing machine and cooking- implements. They asked them if they would take a flare and set it off on the headland opposite the Cam- • bridge 3ay post. They too refused, the girl giving a very graphic representation of a. canoe being swamped by i,ce. The whites respected the Eskimo. Judgment when they eventually fought -'heir way over 200 miles of hummock 'ice to the post. It was barely safe, even then. race believed to be doomed. That the Ekimo will eventually disappear before the ravages of his greatest enemy, tuberculosis, is generally accepted. Civilisation, transported by air, now claims the.Arctic for its own. With the regular mail 'planes come the white man's standards for the Eskimo, and, as recent history shows, an increase in tuberculosis. Only those of this' remarkable race will survive who press northward; even to the Pole, : fchr.nd of civilised forces. The white

man is near enough to it now. The police are established at Baehe Peninsula, only 11 degrees away. The airways will.be there soon, as the Mac Alpine expedition and its attendant events showbd. There is-little hope for the Eskimo. Unlike the buffalo, he cannot be saved. • ,•■■■. •■ „■ ■ , . Major L. T. Burwash ("Burwash of the Arctic"), who as Ohief Inspector of the North-west Territories, has spent 53 years coming and .going among the Eskimos, agroes that tho ■■ white man's diseases have doomed them. He pays, them notable tributes on. the occasion, of his retirement. Without an, Eskimo companion, if ono were available, he. would not go five miles in the --• Far, North, he says. While they still light their fires with flint, steel, and driftwood, the majority of the hunters have given over the bow and arrow to use tn« sporting gun; They keep scurvy away by eating a certain grass that grows in the North. ■: They are quite uumoved, at their first sight of an aeroplane. They have always believed-that their medicine men'could fly, and they graciously concede the white men tho same attribute without according him any undue superiority.