Page:Life with the Esquimaux - 1864 - Volume 2.djvu/343

324 by those on the west side of Davis's Strait. The Innuits with whom I was acquainted could count only ten, as follows:—

However, there was this exception: Koooulearng (Suzhi), whose native place was on the north side of Hudson's Strait, could count to twenty. She said that all the people of her country—meaning Kar-mo-wong, which is on the north side of the strait—could do the same. By signs—that is, by throwing open the fingers, Innuits everywhere can and do count much larger numbers. The dress of the Innuits is made of the skins of reindeer and of seals; the former for winter, the latter for summer. The jacket is round, with no opening in front or behind, but is slipped on and off over the head. It is close-fitting, but not tight. It comes as low as the hips, and has sleeves reaching to the wrists. The women have a long tail to their coat reaching nearly to the ground. These jackets are often very elaborately ornamented. In one of my visits to Sampson, I noticed that his wife's jacket was trimmed thus: Across the neck of the jacket was a fringe of beads—eighty pendents of red, blue, black, and white glass beads, forty beads on each string. Bowls of Britannia metal tea-spoons and table-spoons were on the flap hanging in front. A row of elongated lead shot ran around the border of the tail. Six pairs of Federal copper cents, of various dates, were pendent down the middle of the tail; and a huge brass bell, from an old-fashioned clock, was at the top of the row of cents.

On another occasion, Tweroong, the wife of Miner, came on board with a dress made of the fur of very young deer, with a spencer of reindeer hair cut off short, and so evenly that I could not well understand how it was done. I made