Page:Life with the Esquimaux - 1864 - Volume 2.djvu/89

70 food, and then crouch beneath the old duck's wings to nestle there. Again and again was this done, as if trying all its power to attract the watchful attention of its mother; but it was soon left alone, and Tunukderlien then took care of it. So much time had been consumed in drowning ducks and in sealing that the tide was now against us, forcing us to hold over a while; therefore we landed on Lefferts Island, which is in the midst of Bear Sound. Here I took a walk back upon the island while the Innuits were feasting on ducks and seal. At meridian I took observations for latitude, and soon after we again started, making our way down on the west side of the sound. The ducks we now saw were innumerable; the water and air were black with them.

On arriving at Cape True, the old whaling dépôt, we rested awhile, and I examined the now deserted place. Of course no white man's tent or Innuit tupics were to be seen, but several fragments denoted what had existed there. Frobisher Bay had no ice upon its waters except a few bergs, and not a ripple disturbed its glassy surface. This compelled us to use the oars for some time after leaving this place, and what with the many stoppages made for game by my Innuit companions, and a fog that afterward settled upon us, it was a tedious passage to our second encampment, which was at Cape Cracroft, a point of land connected by a narrow neck with Blunt's Peninsula, instead of at Niountelik, as we had expected. We passed the night as the previous one, and the next morning again proceeded direct for Oopungnewing Island. The same kind of tantalizing but exciting chase after ducks delayed us considerably, until when about two miles from