AMONG UNKNOWN ESKIMO AN ACCOUNT OF TWELVE YEARS INTIMATE RELATIONS WITH THE PRIMITIVE ESKIMO OF ICE-BOUND BAFFIN LAND, WITH A DESCRIPTION OF THEIR WAYS OF LIVING, HUNTING CUSTOMS & BELIEFS BY JULIAN W. BILBY Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society Member of the Folk Lore Society WITH THIRTY-THREE ILLUSTRATIONS & A MAP PHILADELPHIA J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY LONDON: SEELEY, SERVICE & CO., Ltd. 1923 PREFACE In offering the present book on the Eskimo tribes of the Arctics to the reading British public, I must discharge the grateful and pleasing duty of acknowledging my indebtedness for much courtesy and documentary assistance to the Canadian Government, in the person of F. C. C. Lynch, Esq., Superintendent of the “National Resources Branch of the Department of the Interior.” He has been zealously instrumental in enabling me to consult sources of classic recent information of which otherwise I should not have had the confirmation and the benefit, and also has placed at my publishers’ disposal the section of the official map which represents the most up-to-date geographical information about Baffin Land. There is a considerable literature about the Eskimo (as distinct from a quite formidable list of works dealing with travel and voyages in the Arctics) which should be consulted by students of ethnography. The classical authorities in this department are Dr Franz Boas and Dr Rink, a study of whose researches should underlie all the more recent first-hand contributions to what must remain for a long time to come a new subject. For the photographs I am greatly indebted to the Rev. A. L. Fleming, L.T.H., who spent several years among the Eskimo of South Baffin Land. His photos were taken during many intrepid journeys in those wilds, and he knew exactly the scenes it was desired to record by photography in this work. I am also indebted to Miss A. B. Teetgen for her assistance in the literary construction of the book. Finally, I wish to record my admiration and respect for the genial and brave Eskimos of those barren lands, and for the way they face and overcome the difficulties of the Arctic wilds. CONTENTS. PAGE CHAPTER I The Voyage to the Arctics 17 CHAPTER II Baffin Land 32 CHAPTER III Arctic Flora & Fauna 47 CHAPTER IV The Eskimo 56