Page:Life with the Esquimaux - 1864 - Volume 1.djvu/250

Rh a starving bear. But how he did gorge! He swallowed enough, I thought, to have killed six white men, yet he took it without any apparent discomfort. Water was supplied to him, and of this he drank copiously—two quarts went down his camel stomach without drawing breath! Seeing his tremendous attack upon our precious pile of fresh provisions, I really felt alarmed lest he meant to demolish the whole, and leave us without. To feed a hungry man was well enough, and a ready act on the part of all of us; but then for him to have a stomach as huge and voracious as any polar bear, and try to fill that stomach from our limited supply of food, was more than we could reasonably stand. I grew impatient; but finally the angeko gave in. He really had no power to stow away one piece more. He was full to repletion; and, throwing himself flat on the igloo floor, he resigned himself to the heavy task Nature now had to perform in the process of digesting the monstrous heap he had taken within. After a time the angeko told us that one of his wives had accompanied him, but had gone into another igloo. The other wife kept with them as far as she could, when he was obliged to leave her till means of relief could be found. He had built an igloo for her, and then hastened on to our snow village. In the morning Noo-ok-kong, the Innuit lad, went with some food to her, and soon afterward brought her in, thus making an addition of no less than four hungry mouths to aid in consuming our supplies. To add to our dilemma, Ugarng returned on the following day bringing with him three more fasting beings besides himself. They were his mother, Ookijoxy Ninoo, his nephew Eterloong, and his niece Ookoodlear, all related to Ebierbing.

Ugarng, however, brought for me additional supplies from the ship; but I saw quite clearly that, whatever I might feel inclined to do for my late companions in their need, it would never answer to begin supplying all strangers that arrived, particularly the angeko, who was lazy, and living upon the credulity of his people. Therefore I determined to stop this