All History

In 1820, Metcalfe began trying to appeal to a wider audience, utilizing the development of the printed press while connecting the ideas of the Bible Christian Church with those of a variety of reform movements.  

Under Metcalfe’s guidance, ten prevailing principles of the Bible Christian sect were codified in a constitution, emphasizing the real world applications of a biblically guided life. While existing biblical interpretations were invaluable and even prophetic, Bible Christians argued that continued study and interpretation was necessary to avoid the pitfalls of narrow, sectdriven loyalties. The Bible, when approached with an open, scientific mind would continue to reveal new secrets to healthy, ethical living. The Bible Christians emphasized the power of revelation through concerted study rather than blind adherence to the dictates of religious leaders or sects. Meat abstention, temperance, and moral living served to transform an individual “conjoined to the Lord, and the Lord to him.” Thus believers had the capacity to be reformed, regenerated, and finally saved.

The Bible Christians argued that religion, like science, could be rationally understood—emphasizing the power of individual, lay study over bombastic sermonizing. The group downplayed the idea of heavenly revelation in favor of learned epiphany, even questioning the ultimate divinity of Jesus Christ in favor of strict monotheism. The group emphasized that right living in body, mind, and soul ensured salvation for the individual as well as the community at large. The words of the Bible, Bible Christians believed, clearly called for the abstinence from the flesh of animals as food, intoxicating liquors as beverages, as well as war, capital punishment, and slavery. The second coming of the messiah was not a literal, physical event but rather the personal attainment of the divine truths revealed by concentrated study. 

There were, of course, ironies in the principles of Bible Christianity. At the same time that the Bible Christians criticized established churches led by cults of personality, the group was led by a vocal, gregarious personality in Metcalfe. And as church ranks grew, the group sought to build institutions that provided social legitimacy. While the religious and political views of the Bible Christian Church were radical, the group was decidedly conservative in its structure and notion of self-righteousness, sharing these values with other more established Philadelphia churches.  

Metcalfe’s exhortations met harsh responses from Philadelphia’s established religious elite. Warning of the dangers of “wolves in sheep’s clothing,” one Philadelphia religious body accused the Bible Christians of having “attacked the most plain and important doctrines of our holy religion” while seeking to “impose their own creed upon mankind, and take away from us the doctrines for which martyrs bled.” Bible Christians were often met in the streets with accusations of heresy. It seemed apparent to the Bible Christians that meat did, in fact, stir up animalistic responses in its consumers.  

Despite the angry reactions, the church and its membership continued to grow, thanks in part to a series of articles published in The Rural Magazine and Literary Evening Friend , an agricultural and literary-themed periodical headquartered in Philadelphia. In a series of “Letters on Religious Subjects” published throughout 1820 and 1821, Metcalfe expounded on a variety of reformist ideals, connecting them with religious justifi cations and explanations. In “The Duty of Abstinence from All Intoxicating Drinks,” he off ered one of the fi rst arguments in the United States for total avoidance of alcohol.

Dividing into parties, the hunters pursue different directions, endeavoring, however, whenever practicable, to encircle a certain amount of territory, with the object of driving the quarry toward a common centre. Again, the small parties follow the same plan on a smaller scale, each one surrounding a miniature meadow, or grassy glade; so that, if the number of hunters is large, there are many small circles within the limits of the general circumference of the hunt.

The winter hunt for buffalo in the Fur Land is generally made by stalking the animals in the deep snow on snowshoes. To hunt the herds on horseback, as in summer, would be an impossibility; the snow hides the murderous badger-holes that cover the prairie surface, and to gallop weak horses on such ground would be certain disaster. By this method of hunting the stalker endeavors to approach within gunshot of his quarry by stealthily creeping upon them, taking advantage of every snow-drift, bush, or depression in the prairie, which will screen his person from view. And it is a more difficult feat to approach a band of buffalo than it would appear on first thought. When feeding the herd is more or less scattered, but at sight of the hunter it rounds and closes into a tolerably compact circular mass. If the stalker attempts an open advance on foot-concealment being impossible from the nature of the ground--the buffalo always keep sheering off as soon as he gets within two hundred yards of the nearest. If he follows, they merely repeat the movement, and always manage to preserve the same distance. Although there is not the slightest danger in approaching a herd, it requires, in a novice, an extraordinary amount of nerve. When he gets within three hundred yards, the bulls on that side, with head erect, tail cocked in the air, nostrils expanded, and eyes that seem to flash fire, walk uneasily to and fro, menacing the intruder by pawing the earth and tossing their huge heads. The hunter still approaching, some bull will face him, lower his head, and start on a most furious charge. But alas for brute courage! When he has gone thirty yards he thinks better of it, stops, stares an instant, and then trots back to the herd. Another and another will try the same strategy, with the same result, and if, in spite of these ferocious demonstrations, the hunter still continues to advance, the whole herd will incontinently take to its heels.

By far the best method of stalking a herd in the snow is to cover oneself with a white blanket, or sheet, in the same manner as the Indians use the wolf skin. In this way the animal cannot easily get the hunter's wind, and are prevented from distinguishing him amidst the surrounding snow. The buffalo being the most stupid and sluggish of Plain animals and endowed with the smallest possible amount of instinct, the little that he has seems adapted rather for getting him into difficulties than out of them. If not alarmed at sight or smell of the stalker, he will stand stupidly gazing at his companions in their death throes until the whole band is shot down.

When the hunter is skilled in the stalk, and the buffalo are plentiful, the wild character of the sport almost repays him for the hardships he endures. With comrades equally skillful he surrounds the little meadows into which he has stalked his quarry. Well posted, the hunter nearest the herd delivers his fire. In the sudden stupid halt and stare of the bewildered animals immediately following, he often gets in a second and third shot. Then comes the wild dash of the frightened herd toward the opening in the park, when the remaining hunters instantly appear, pouring in their fire at short range, and pretty certain of securing their game.

The cutting up follows; and the rapidity with which a skillful hunter completes the operation is little short of marvelous. When time permits, the full process is as follows : He begins by skinning the buffalo, then takes off the head, and removes the paunch and offal as far as the heart; next he cuts off the legs and shoulders and back. The chest, with the neck attached, now remains--a strange-looking object, that would scare a respectable larder into fits-and this he Proceeds to lay beside the other joints, placing there also such internal parts as are considered good. Over the whole he then draws the skin, and having planted a stick in the ground close by, with a handkerchief or some such thing fastened to it to keep off the wolves, the operation of cutting up is complete, and the animal is ready for conveyance to camp when the sledges arrive. The half-breed goes through this whole process with a large and very heavy knife, like a narrow and pointed cleaver, which is also used for cutting wood, and performing all the offices of a hatchet; but unwieldy as it is, a practiced hand can skin the smallest and most delicate creatures with it as easily as with a pocket-knife.

A few days' successful stalking generally supplies a party with sufficient meat, and, unless hunting for robes, they are not likely to linger long upon the bleak plains for the mere sake of sport. The winter stalk is emphatically a "pot-hunt," the term "sport" being scarcely pertinent to a chase involving so serious discomfort. A cache of the meat is accordingly made, from which supplies may be drawn as required. And this cache has to be made in a very substantial manner to resist the attacks of wolves, which invariably hang about the camp of the hunter. Generally speaking, it is made in the form of a pyramid, the ends of the logs being sunk slightly into the ground, against which a huge bank of snow is heaped. This, when well beaten down, and coated with ice by means of water poured over it, holds the timber firmly in position, and is perfectly impregnable to a whole army of wolves, though a wolverine will certainly break it open if he finds it.

At last comes the departure. The sledges are packed with melting rib, fat brisket, and luscious tongues; the cowering dogs are again rudely roused from their dream of lit far-off day, which never comes for them, when the whip shall be broken and hauling shall be no more. Amid fierce imprecation, the cracking of whips, deep-toned yells, and the grating of the sledges upon the frozen snow, the camp in the poplar thicket is left behind. The few embers of the deserted campfire glow cheerily for a while, then moulder slowly away. The wolves, growing bolder as the day wears on, steal warily in, and devour such refuse as the dogs have left. As night settles silently down, the snow begins to fall. It comes slowly, in a whirling mist of snowflakes that dazzles and confuses the eye. The ashes of the camp-fire, mingling with it, take on a lighter grey; the hard casing of the cache receives a fleecy covering. Feathery shafts of snow, shaken from the long tree-branches, fly like white-winged birds down over what has been the camp. But all traces of its use are hidden by the spotless mantle flung from above. The coming morning reveals only a pyramidal drift of snow among the aspens–around, a hopeless, uncharted, trackless sea of white.

Such is the winter stalk--a hunt that has often formed the theme of the traveler's story. And yet it may be doubted if there has ever been placed before the reader's vision anything like a true account of the overpowering sense of solitude, of dreary, endless space, of awful desolation, which at times fills the hunter's mind, as, peering from some swelling ridge or aspen thicket, he sees a lonely herd of buffalo, in long, scattered file, trailing across the snow-wrapt, interminable expanse into the shadows of the coming night.

Life to the white stranger temporarily resident in the winter camp becomes after a season pleasant enough. The study of Indian and half-breed character and customs, the visits of his barbarian neighbors, the exciting incidents of his everyday life, all conspire to relieve the monotony which would otherwise hang over him like a pall. It is true that of life other than human there is a meagre supply; a magpie or screaming jay sometimes flaunts its gaudy plumage on the meat-stage; in the early morning a sharp-tailed grouse croaks in the fir or spruce-trees; and at dusk, when every other sound is hushed, the owl hoots its lonely cry. Besides human companionship, however, the white resident of the winter camp has many pleasures of a more æsthetic character. It is pleasant at night, when returning from a long jaunt on snowshoes or dog-sledge, to reach the crest of the nearest ridge and see, lying below one, the straggling camp, the red glow of the firelight gleaming through the parchment windows of the huts, the bright sparks flying upward amid the sombre pine-tops, and to feel that, however rude it may be, yet there in all that vast wilderness is the one place he may call home. Nor is it less pleasant when, as the night wears on, the long letter is penned, the familiar book read, while the log fire burns brightly and the dogs sleep quietly stretched before it. Many a night thus spent is spread out in those pictures which memory weaves in after life, each pleasure distinct and real, each privation blended with softened colors.

Metcalfe followed his protemperance essay in 1821 with Bible Testimony: On Abstinence from the Flesh of Animals , his first piece articulating the moral, religious, and health justifications of a meatless diet. At the heart of Metcalfe’s argument in favor of a flesh-free lifestyle was his interpretation of the biblical commandment against killing, whose application he believed “was benevolently intended to reach the animal creation.” The fact that the prohibition had not been understood as such was proof of humanity’s degradation. Humanity, however, had the power of reason to follow such prohibitions. 

Metcalfe equated meat consumption with violent, cruel tendencies, appealing to the most uncontrolled whims of human aggression. Even more than alcoholic spirits, a carnivorous diet was deleterious to the soul, an affront to the natural forces of life. Further, meat consumption was a violent rejection of God itself, a notion expressed by one Bible Christian hymn that warned, “Hold daring man! From murder stay: God is the life in all, You smite at God! When flesh you slay: Can such a crime be small?”

  It was the Bible Christians’ goal to “instruct . . . to correct general sentiment and to determine the principles of public habits so as to cherish universal humanity.” Metcalfe placed abstention from meat at the center of a plan for total reform. Once the church accomplished its goal of converting nonbelievers to its violence-free diet, Metcalfe believed that individuals would “withdraw themselves from a system of cruel habits . . . which has unquestionably a baneful eff ect upon the physical existence and the intellectual, the moral and religious powers of man.” The benefits of a vegetable based diet—mental clarity, a sense of morality, and an adherence to nonviolence—allowed individuals to lead lives of “benevolence,” caring for the “souls of all men.”  

Metcalfe’s pamphlet was the first published creed in favor of total avoidance of meat in the United States. The booklet helped spread the idea of a meatless diet to the general public, connecting food choices with a variety of reform principles ranging from pacifi sm to antislavery. And while Metcalfe was fundamentalist in his religious outlook, he utilized modern technologies and an Enlightenment-inspired emphasis on rational study to spread the word of his church. What started as a group of twenty families had nearly doubled by 1825, garnering increased attention among interested social reformers in Philadelphia.

"I here would observe that I permit the patient to take the meat in any way which he prefers. Of course roast and boiled mutton and beef are principally employed. Patients I believe could scarcely be prevailed upon to live upon meats rancid and putrid. Indeed I never made the trial as I found by experience that even when they were permitted to take the meat in such variety and manner as they pleased not one would entirely refrain from vegetables although convinced that they were hurtful. All the patients who employed a meat diet soon became fatter and stronger and made less water materially and that of a less diabetic quality than before. The amendment appeared the most conspicuously in the worst cases. Miss Y.Z. (3) was so much reduced and the disease appeared to be making such rapid progress that I believe she could not have lived above a month or six weeks longer had the complaint been left to itself. Mr B.I. (5) was still worse and I have no doubt would have died within a fortnight. Yet after this Miss Y.Z. (3) recovered so far that she could continue in bed through the whole night frequently without rising to make water and could walk five or six miles at once without material fatigue and Mr B.l. (5) who had been a remarkably active man in business amended to such a degree that he carried on his business with the same activity as before his illness. Amendment though not to the same extent was equally perceptible in the other patients who employed a meat diet. Yet that it had not effected a cure was evident from this circumstance that whenever they deviated materially from the meat diet the diabetic symptoms were induced".

Other naturalists were critical of Diluvialism: the Church of Scotland pastor John Fleming published opposing arguments in a series of articles from 1823 onwards. He was critical of the assumption that fossils resembling modern tropical species had been swept north "by some violent means", which he regarded as absurd considering the "unbroken state" of fossil remains. For example, fossil mammoths demonstrated adaptation to the same northern climates now prevalent where they were found. He criticized Buckland's identification of red mud in the Kirkdale cave as diluvial, when near identical mud in other caves had been described as fluvial.[5] While Cuvier had reconciled geology with a loose reading of the biblical text, Fleming argued that such a union was "indiscreet" and turned to a more literal view of Genesis:[30]

But if the supposed impetuous torrent excavated valleys, and transported masses of rocks to a distance from their original repositories, then must the soil have been swept from off the earth to the destruction of the vegetable tribes. Moses does not record such an occurrence. On the contrary, in his history of the dove and the olive-leaf plucked off, he furnishes a proof that the flood was not so violent in its motions as to disturb the soil, nor to overturn the trees which it supported.

Fleming was a vitalist who was strongly opposed to materialism. He believed that a 'vital principle' was inherent in the embryo with the capacity of "developing in succession the destined plan of existence."[8] He was a close associate of Robert Edmond Grant, who considered that the same laws of life affected all organisms.

In 1824, Fleming became involved in a famous controversy with the geologist William Buckland (1784–1856) about the nature of The Flood as described in the Bible. In 1828, he published his History of British Animals. This book addressed not only extant, but also fossil species. It explained the presence of fossils by climate change, suggesting that extinct species would have survived if weather conditions had been favorable. These theories contributed to the advancement of biogeography, and exerted some influence on Charles Darwin (1809–1882). Flemings' comments on instinct in his book Philosophy of Zoology had influenced Darwin.[9]

In 1831, Fleming found some fossils which he recognized as fish in the Old Red Sandstone units at Fife. This did not fit the generally accepted notion that the Earth was approximately 6,000 years old.

Partial list of publications

• 1821: Insecta in Supplement to the fourth, fifth and sixth editions of the Encyclopae-dia Britannica, with preliminary dissertations on the history of the sciences

• 1822: Philosophy of Zoology (Volume 1, Volume 2)

• 1828: A History of British animals, exhibiting the descriptive characters and systematical arrangement of the genera and species of quadrupeds, birds, reptiles, fishes, mollusca, and radiata of the United Kingdom, including the indigenous, extirpated , and extinct kinds, together with periodical and occasional visitants Edinburgh: i–xxiii + 1–565.

• 1837: Molluscous Animals

• 1851: The Temperature of the Seasons, and Its Influence on Inorganic Objects, and on Plants and Animals

An Experimental Inquiry on Poisoning by Oxalic Acid - 1823

Dr Robert Christison experimented on dogs by giving them 50 grams of pure oxalic acid, which generally causes vomiting, so in order to observe what happens, he sutured the stomach to prevent vomiting. 

He makes observations at different minute marks below:

2’ He began to make violent efforts to vomit, which were frequently repeated, till
12’, when they ceased; and the breathing became full and frequent; sensibility unimpaired; great restlessness,
16’ 30”. Breathing short, and at times suspended for a few seconds; he then hung the head in a peculiar manner, looked very dull, lay down on the side, and would not rise when stirred; at last, when he was set on his legs, he walked easily across the room; suddenly the breathing became very quick and short, and then ceased, although the chest was quite relaxed ; he staggered a few paces, and sank down on the side at
20’, motionless and senseless; the body was now spasmodically extended for a second or two, after which he made a few convulsive gasps; no pulsation could be felt in the region of the heart after the 20th minute.
21’. Death being complete, the body was opened without delay. The heart was distended in its pulmonary cavities, and not contractile; the blood in those cavities was dark, in the aortal florid, in both fluid, and coagulated almost immediately in loose clots.

There are 15 pages of further experiments recorded.

August 21.- We now pushed for the Fiord or opening to the south, which I expected would lead us again to the coast. After pulling a distance of sixteen miles, we encamped a tour sixth station. The inlet was from a quarter of a mile to a mile and a half in breadth, but of a sufficient depth of water for a vessel drawing 14 feet; the sides were more level than the shores we had hitherto passed the mountains not rising so abruptly from the sea, and the face of the country presenting a less barren and heath-like appearance. We shot some swans, which we found excellent eating. 

August 22.- Proceeded up the inlet, the head of which we soon reached : it terminated in low marshy land, about eighteen miles from its entrarice from the bay; named it Loch Fine. Up to this period, with the exception of the gale on the night of the 17th, we had had a constant calm, accompanied with the most beautiful and serene weather, so that the whole distance we had hitherto come, we had always occasion to make use of our oars. After refreshing ourselves at our seventh station, we started on our return, with a fine breeze from the southward, and made such progress, that we were enabled to reach our Esquimaux friends the same evening, although it had again fallen calm, and we were obliged to ply our oars for the last seven miles. 

August 23. and 24. 

These two days were spent with the natives, whom we found to consist of twelve in number, including women and children. We were well received by them, but our attempts at making ourselves understood were very unsuccessful. They are evidently the same race as the Esquimaux in the other parts of Greenland and the northern parts of America. Our intercourse was of too short duration to acquire any of their language ; but the descriptions given by Captains Parry and Lyons of the natives at Igluleik, in many particulars resembled those of our friends. I observed particularly the same superstitious ceremony of sprinkling water over a seal or walrus before they commence skinning it. 

Their amazement at seeing one of the seamen shoot a seal was quite unbounded. They heard for the first time the report of a musket, and turning round in the direction in which the animal was killed, and floating on the water, one of them was desired to go in his canoe and fetch it. Before landing it he turned it round and round, till he observed where the ball had penetrated, and, putting his finger into the hole, set up a most extraordinary shout of astonishment, dancing and capering in the most absurd manner. He was afterwards desired to skin it, which he did expeditiously and well. Wishing to give them farther proofs of our skill in shooting, several muskets were fired at a mark, but without permitting them to see us load. A pistol was afterwards put into their hands,and one of them fired into the water; the recoil startled him so much, that he immediately slunk away into his tent. 

The following morning we found they had all left us, leaving their tents and every thing behind, which I have no doubt was occasioned by their alarm at the firing.

The Bible Christians came to the United States as a largely working-class group, drawn toward a meatless diet in cities like Liverpool and Manchester because of its affordability. While the group advocated for dietary reform while in England, it did little to reach out beyond its own small community. However, once in the United States and under Metcalfe’s guidance, Bible Christians began to branch outward. While many of the church’s original settlers left Bible Christianism aft er arriving in Philadelphia, the group’s reform-oriented ethos appealed to sectors of the city’s growing middle class.  

Spurred by Metcalfe’s growing visibility, and despite the group’s avowed antisectarian principles, the Bible Christians began to formalize their organization. In May 1823, they purchased a plot of land in Philadelphia’s Kensington neighborhood on the north side of the city. On December 21, the Bible Christian Church opened its doors for the first time on North Third Street and Girard Avenue. With a new, more visible presence the group continued to grow, welcoming in a combination of converts and recently arrived British Bible Christian migrants. In 1830, the group was formally incorporated by the Pennsylvania state legislature. As the Bible Christians’ constitution specified, “none can be members . . . but those who conform to the rules, regulations, and discipline of said Church; which rules require abstinence from animal food.”  

Metcalfe’s increasing public presence helped spread the vegetable diet gospel outside the walls of the Bible Christian Church, introducing the notion to a general public that was becoming increasingly interested in reform. With its evangelical, reformist tradition, Philadelphia was the perfect city for the Bible Christians to attempt their experiment in meatless living. Knowledge of the Bible Christians’ creed continued to grow, even beyond Philadelphia.

Attempts to produce cottonseed oil were made in South Carolina about 18I5, some of them failing for lack of hulling the seed, though tests in lamps “in comparison with spermaceti oil” showed that the cottonseed oil “was decidedly the best.“′ 

Additional efforts and experiments were made in the Carolinas and Virginia in the twenties. Niles’ Register, May 15, 1824, cited the Raleigh Register on the subject of an “Interesting Discovery” by Professor Olmsted, of the University of North Carolina. He had “ascertained that a fine illuminating gas may be obtained from cottonseed,” in the proportion of twice as much from a bushel as from New Castle coal. This use of cottonseed had been suggested by a Baltimore man, who had experimented with extracting oil from cottonseed and written an article on the subject. Southern cottonseed might illuminate nearly every city in the United States! 

Machinery for the two essential processes of hulling or crushing the seed and pressing it was devised, operated, and sold in the late twenties and early thirties by Francis Follett and Jabez Smith, of Petersburg, Virginia, who attracted attention in the Carolinas and Georgia. These men wrote in 1833 that they had erected three cottonseed oil mills on their own account, while several mills of their manufacture had been set up by others, and that business based on their machines was “progressing rapidly in the cotton growing states in the west.” They claimed for their largest hulling machine a capacity of sixty bushels of hulled kernels in ten hours.6 Two horses furnished the power; an air current from a fan separated the hulls and kernels after the seed was crushed between two revolving stones. Follett and Smith’s pressing arrangement included haircloth envelopes in mortars, with pestles for forcing the oil out of the crushed seed as in the making of linseed oil.7 

Superiority was claimed for a machine of a different type in operation at Athens, Georgia. This machine used a block-and-spike system for hulling the seed, and the press that accompanied it sold for $750.8 It was mentioned in 1829 that oil was being extracted from cottonseed at New York for 15 cents a gallon, or for 5 cents a gallon if the cake was retained at the mill, with a slight additional charge for refining the oil, and that Gideon Palmer was operating a machine at New London, Connecticut.9

Image from: https://ia903404.us.archive.org/10/items/nilesnationalreg45nile/nilesnationalreg45nile.pdf

In 1967, I lived some months at Coral Harbour on Southampton Island in northern Hudson Bay and often traveled with Tommy Nakoolak, then, at sixty-two, patriarch of the island's sizable Nakoolak clan. Of Knud Rasmussen, the great Danish ethnologist, it was said that he was the only man known who collected old women. They, of course, were the repositories of the ancient tales he loved and recorded. Similarly, whenever possible, I lived and traveled with older Inuit who told and taught me many things the lore, the legends, the skills of their people. 

Tommy Nakoolak was small and wiry, kind and considerate, and he owned a Peterhead boat, the Tereglu (the word for a baby bearded seal), which he handled as if it were a racing yawl. One day along Coats Island, south of Southampton Island, he spotted a herd of walruses on a rocky promontory. "You want pictures?" he asked, and when I said yes, he swung the boat around and headed full speed for the rocks. He sheered past them so closely, I tensed instinctively for the coming crash, but Tommy only smiled. Like many old-time Inuit, he had an astounding geographical memory and knew every rock and ridge along hundreds of miles of coast. 

One day while his sons were hunting caribou on Coats Island, Tommy said: "Come, I'll show you something." He took the Tereglu to a secluded bay near Cape Pembroke. Ashore were ancient stone houses, man-high cairns, box-like graves built of large flat stones, and everywhere masses of bleached bones of caribou, walrus, bowhead whale, and seal. "This is where the Sadlermiut lived," said Tommy. A mysterious, long-isolated Stone Age people, the Sadlermiut were briefly known to the outside world and then all were killed by a whaler-brought disease in the winter of 1902. They may even have been Tunit, the powerful Dorset-culture people. Extinct everywhere else for 800 years, they had found a final refuge on these isolated islands. (The people who now live on Southampton Island are descendants of mainland Inuit brought by whalers and traders to the island to replace the extinct Sadlermiut.) 

The Sadlermiut were "discovered" in the summer of 1824 by the explorer Captain G.F. Lyon of the Royal Navy. He anchored his ship, HMS Griper, off Cape Pembroke. From the camp which Tommy Nakoolak was showing me, a man approached the Griper, riding on a most peculiar craft. It consisted of "three inflated seal- skins, connected most ingeniously by blown intestines, so that his vessel was extremely buoyant." The man's legs dangled in the water while he propelled this strange float toward the ship with a narrow- bladed paddle made of whale bone. The poor man had never seen other humans before and he was afraid: "his teeth chattered and himself and seal-skins trembled in unison. 

Lyon went ashore. The people were shy but friendly, of "mild manners, quiet speech, and as grateful for kindness, as they were anxious to return it." The men wore pants of polar-bear fur; their mittens were the skins of murres, feathers inside. The women were slightly tattooed, and "their hair was twisted into a short club, which hung over each temple." The men's topknots were even more impressive: "Each man had an immense mass of hair as large as the head of a child, rolled into the form of a ball, and projecting from the rise of the forehead." 

Once the Sadlermiut had been numerous. At Native Point on Southampton Island, the archaeologist Henry B. Collins of the Smithsonian Institution found, in 1954, "the largest aggregation of old Eskimo house ruins in the Canadian Arctic." But whalers began to stop at the islands and contact with another world was fatal to the long-isolated people. When the whaling captain George Comer visited Southampton Island in 1896, only seventy Sadlermiut were left. Comer admired the strength and courage of these "fearless people" who had only stone-tipped harpoons and spears: "For an Eskimo in his frail kayak to attempt to capture a [50-ton/ 45-tonne] whale with the primitive implements which they manufactured meant great courage. 

In the fall of 1902, the whaler Active stopped at Southampton Island. One sailor was sick; he may have had typhus or typhoid. Sadlermiut visited the ship and took the disease back to their village. That winter the last Sadlermiut died in lonely agony upon their island. Collins studied their house ruins and graves in 1954 and 1955 and "found evidence that the Sadlermiut descended from the Dorsets - that they were in fact the last survivors of the Dorset culture."