He is a perfect
Esquimau Samson, and when he is on one end of a line, with his feet
braced against a hummock, the walrus at the other end has no advantage.
Indeed, the odds are in favor of Oxeomadiddlee. His singular name is
self-imposed, and is an Inuit expression of greeting, or rather when
one unexpectedly arrives, as the clown says, "Here we are again," and
occurred in this way. Several years ago he was hunting walrus in the
pack-ice, when the wind changed and blew the ice away from shore. This
is a contingency to which the hunters are constantly liable, and is the
greatest danger to which they are subjected in their pursuit. Many are
thus carried away, sometimes out to sea, and are never heard from
again; while others have been drifted a long distance from their homes
before the drift again touched the shore-ice and allowed them to find
their way back, if possible. Sometimes they starve to death before the
ice again lands, though occasionally they are quite comfortable under
such circumstances, as, for instance, were four who were carried off
just before we started on our trip to King William Land a year ago last
spring. Equeesik and his brother Owanork, who were to accompany us, and
Nanook and Blucher were thus carried off from Depot Island, with one of
our sleds and a dead walrus which they were cutting up at the time.
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