To do this the conjuror sits down with his face to the wall, and drawing his hood well over his features, rocks himself backwards and forwards, calling the while on his familiar spirit (his Tongak) to come to him. He continues this howling and rocking until such concentration of mind is effected that he becomes unconscious; he foams at the mouth. Whilst in this condition of self-induced hypnotism—or however the spiritists may explain it—his spirit, it is believed, goes below to Sedna, or above to the regions of beatitude, to find out what has been the cause of the guilt in question, and discover the requisite punishment. The interesting thing about this performance is that it is by no means the tissue of imposture one might suppose. The Eskimo conjuror may be no more and no less a fraud than the medium of a spiritistic séance. The writer has been creditably assured by these practitioners that the trance ensues in the vision of a great white light (like the light thrown on a sheet by the magic lantern), and then in that illumination they see the whole scene of the supposed crime re-enacted, all the people implicated in it, and its every detail. They are told, or inspired, what penalty to inflict. On returning to consciousness, the vision is not forgotten, but sharply remembered. The conjuror is able to accuse the offender, to question him, and extort a confession from him. The penalty generally takes the form of some obnoxious task to be performed or some fine to be paid in kind. This power to see the white light and to project in it the thoughts, probably, of the assistants at the conjuration—for the performance, when genuine, amounts to nothing less—is really a remarkable psychic feat. Probably the conjurors understand it as little as the laity; they have only trained themselves to achieve it, and they explain it according to the fantastic body of superstition which constitutes the Eskimo religion. It is only after long practice and the sustained effort after great mental concentration that the manifestation is attained, that the light can be seen, and incidents recorded in it. This is the final test for the honours of full conjurorship. The candidates sit night after night with the teacher, faces to the wall, and the lamps burning low, shutting out all extraneous objects and distractions, in the endeavour to see the light, to pass into trance. Those who remain for ever unable to arrive at this, fail to pass the test, and are rejected from the class of the full-fledged. They must content themselves with minor dignities in the order of conjurors. One of these inferior grades is that of the Kunneyo, the one who incants for the seal hunters. Another is the Makkosâktok, the one who goes round with the whip during the Sedna ceremonies; and a third is the Noonageeksaktok, another official at the great annual celebration.