Human Predatory Pattern

The Indians native to the Canadian Northewst Territories belong to the Dene nation, and are subdivided into the following tribes: the Hares, the Loucheux, the Yellowknives, the Slaves, the Dogribs, and the Chipewyans. Their languages have a common root in the Athabaska languagegroup. 

We know but little of the history of these tribes. By means of a number of dissociated and incomplete sources alone are we able to trace through the general thread of their story. As a rough outline, indicating something of their earlier modes of life, a few facts must be mentioned: First and foremost, these peoples were hunters and nomads, the majority of whom were constantly migrating with the caribou. Their weapons consisted of spears and arrows tipped with flint, and various trapping devices, such as snares and nets of animal hide (the latter also of bast) and primitive deadfalls. Fire they obtained for the most part by striking sparks from pyrites. Their shelter was a tepee of caribou-skins, their means of transport dog-sleds, snowshoes, and birch-bark canoes. These were poor weapons with which to conduct a struggle for existence in a land where the Arctic winter lasts eight months of the year. Considering, then, the constant warfare waged amongst themselves and with strange tribes, as well as those periods when wild game was scarce, it is evident that these people lived a difficult life. 

The advent of the fur-traders opened new possibilities to these natives. A rough choice of the goods of civilization was then accessible to them, and the price for these was pelts. The Indians no longer found it necessary to keep wandering about the country in quest of game in order to remain alive. The doors of the trading stores stood open to anyone who had a beaver, fox, lynx, or marten to offer in exchange. There were not only food and tools to be had, but weapons which were more effective than the old. This introduction of white civilization meant that the Indians, in addition to their ancient form of hunting, could undertake, if they liked, the harvesting of pelts and thus make a livelihood in a more limited field. 

The majority of northern Canada's Indian tribes yielded, to a remarkable degree, to these new conditions. This marked the beginning of a new era. Hunting in the wilderness still constituted the most substantial and the most perfect form of existence, but it was no longer essential to life in the same way it had been in the past. Their society began to take on a different tone when, with a safer mode of existence open to them, they were no longer obliged to pursue their own more exacting struggle for food, wherein all was risked upon one mad dash, good luck, and their own alertness. Necessary adjustments were made, for weal as well as woe, but, in any event, the result for them was a life more insipid than their old. 

One may find branches of the Dene nation, however, which still retain their ancient heritage — the Barren Land Indians. A few of the goods of civilization have filtered through to them, via the channel of fur-trading, but the primitive impulse which guides their daily lives is as firm as ever, and outside influences have altered to but a slight degree their original culture. Their existence follows the lines set by their ancestors, whether it be symbolized by their perpetual expeditions through forest or over barren plain in search of the wandering caribou, by their battle against blizzard and winter's cold, by their feasts and general gormandizing when the country is flooded with deer, or by their dark hours of need and starvation when the country lies empty about them. 

The term " Barren Land Indians " includes the people of several tribes. Their hunting-grounds are the lands which follow the timber-line from Hudson Bay northwest to the Mackenzie delta, where the river empties into the Polar Sea. In its broader outlines, a common culture here exists. My statements apply in particular to the peoples east and northeast of Great Slave Lake, the peoples amongst whom I have lived and whose life and activities I have already mentioned in some detail in earlier chapters. In the following pages I shall attempt to include a number of facts which I have heretofore failed to mention or but loosely touched upon.

The Brooks Mountains are a world of their own, almost untouched. One may wander far and wide through valleys and gorges, along rivers and lakes, and enjoy the fine flavour of the land's virginity. One can meet mountain sheep or bears which stand rooted to the ground at the sight of a man, because they have never seen such a thing before. Giant trout swim in the lakes, multiply, and die of old age. And in the heart of the mountains is a little band of men. 

The Nunamiuts in the Brooks Mountains are divided into two groups, the Raven people (Tulugarmiut) and the Killik people (Killermiut). The people have little knowledge of the world outside. 

Between the Nunamiuts and the outer world there is such a wide, tangled wilderness that communication has to be by plane. The main prop of their existence is, as I have said, the airman Sig Wien. Sevele times a year he or one of his men flies in with a quantity of simple things such as ammunition, tobacco, coffee, a little cotton material for the women, knives, sauce-pans, etc., and takes their wolfskins in exchange. What the Eskimos thus obtain from outside is very modest in quantity, for they are poor and transport is expensive.

There is thus a dash of civilization in the Eskimos' material culture, but in essentials their life takes the same shape as that of their ancestors. Caribou hunting is vital to them now as before; from it they obtain food, clothes, tents, sewing thread, rope, etc. Caribou meat is, generally speaking, served at all meals. They live a nomad life in the caribou's tracks. If luck is with them, and thousands of beasts stream over the country-side in the neighbourhood of the settlement, there are rejoicings and festivities among the mountain people. But it may happen that the barren country is empty, with not a living creature in sight. The last time the caribou failed, many Nunamiuts died of starvation. 

Of civilized food there is barely a trace. The Killik people, who were unlucky with their wolf hunting the year before, have practically nothing. One or two of the Raven people have some coffee, a scrap of sugar, and a little tobacco. The small quantity of bought food is just a dash of luxury to vary the caribou meat which is the universal food. 

Paniaq is the kind of man one cannot help noticing. His eyes are brown, with a humorous gleam; his mouth is wide and sensitive. The forehead is well arched, the nose high-bridged and straight. The black-browed temples project a little; the chin bone too is clearly marked, but not strikingly so. His complexion is rather dark. He is about fifty, but his hair has no tinge of grey. He is a tall, splendidly built man, broad-chested, narrow at the hips, with sinewy limbs. His height is 5 feet 9 inches. He weighs about 175 pounds. His hands are small and well shaped. He seems as well trained as a long-distance runner and has the easy walk of the mountain dwellers.

We start talking about all kinds of things, mostly of animals, nature, and the Eskimos' life is days gone by. From time to time there is a touch of humour, and he bursts into a roar of laughter. He also a very good memory. "My good memory comes from my mother," he says. "She remembered everything, and when I was little she told me no end of things about the old times."

He has an admirable mental balance, a capacity for taking reverses calmly. 

...

At last Paniaq's wife, Umialaq, sets before us some cooked and some raw meat, and we eat it. 

Umialaq is about twenty-nine--twenty years younger than her husband. She is pretty, small, and slight, but as tought as a willow. 

The youngest boy, Wiraq, crawls about the floor of willow boughs, almost naked. He is only a year old, but has already begun to suck meat. 

Paniaq's father in law Kakinnaq, aged fifty, lives nearby. Kakinnaq is an individual type, a thick-set little fellow with a black mustache, as quick as a weasel and bubbling over with life. 

Kakinnaq is the umialik (rich man) of the tribe. According to our ideas he does not own much, but the Eskimos tell one with profound respect that Kakinnaq has more dried fat than he can use himself and both wolf and wolverine skins from previous years. 

Aguk is about seventy. A more vigorous old fellow I have never seen, active from the early morning til late in the evening. He runs over the hills like a wolf. It is a sight to see him out hunting, getting over the ground in a very pronounced forward crouch of his own. And when he fires he never misses; ten of fifteen caribou in one hunt is nothing out of the ordinary for him. He has a bright face covered with laugh wrinkles. He is a thoroughly good fellow, of the type which is always eager to help others. And he helps himself where most get stuck.

Then there is Agmalik, a capable hunter of about fifty. He is tall and thin, with a rather curved nose and protruding lips, and seems generally rather different from the others. 

The most distinguised among the Killik people is Maptiraq, about seventy-five years old, a tall, upright gentleman of the old school, with a quiet manner and a warm gleam in his eye. His whole personality bears the stamp of the culture which has been created in the course of the years by a distinguised hunting people. When he was young, there were still people who hunted the caribou with bow and arrows. He has experienced a good deal that to other Eskimos is history. In spite of his age he still hunts the caribou and wolf and cuts a good figure. 

Inualujaq is another veteran; he may well be about sixty-five. He is reputed to have been one of the best runners in the mountains in his younger days. He is a quiet, pleasant man and an energetic hunter. 

The many children are like a fresh breeze blowing through this little community among the mountains. And these children are something out of the common. They are mountain children, these--with deep, wide chests and powerful limbs and aglow with vitality. At three years old they dash up the hillsides like goats, at seven they can run for a long time without getting tired. They are like animals in their sensitive alertness and swift reactions. And they are sharp. 

It is something of a marvel to find an Eskimo community in Alaska so sound and vital as this one. This is due in the first place to the people having had so little contact with civilization. While the coast Eskimos have felt the full blast of modern culture--brandy, civilized food, disease, and a view of life based on dollars--the Nunamiuts have, on the whole, escaped it. They have their mountain world to themselves. 

Venereal diseases do not exist, and I know of only one case of tuberculosis. It is also worth mentioning that there is no alcohol. Their greatest danger is the aircraft, which can introduce sicknesses which the Eskimos have little power to resist. Last year, after a plane had landed at the camp for a short time, the whole population was struck down by severe influenza. Three children and one adult died, and others only just pulled through.

There is something so good-humoured and cordial about these people that one cannot help liking them. They have an infectious humour which makes life brighter, a broad humanity with few reservations. Yet it is easy enough to put one's finger on things that jar. And there are dark spaces in their souls. Suddenly, and at times when one least expects it, some utterly primitive feeling will flash out, savage and incomprehensible. Sometimes the situation becomes such that it is better for a white man to exercise patience than to prove himself right. 

But one can say unreservedly that they are easy to live with. It is a solace to be with people who are absolutely themselves, who make no effort to assert themselves, who make it their object in life not to elbow forward, but to get some brightness out of the days as they pass. 

Transcribed by Travis Statham - from the physical book. Some passages/sentences are ommitted for sake of space and importance. 

We are sixty-five human beings who have to eat our fill every day, and nearly two hundred dogs. Whether we shall depends on hunting. I brought a quantity of provisions with me, but obviously I, the only white man, cannot sit brooding over my possessions. Some went to the children, some to other people, and in an incredibly short time it was all gone. It was a relief in a way, for now we are all in the same boat.

Everything depends on the caribou. The caribou is always in our thoughts. When we come together they are the main subject of our conversation, and if we are doing one thing or another with outside the tent, we cannot help searching the valleys and hills with our eyes. 

From Raven Lake two long lines of cairns have been set up, one running up the hillside, the other along the valley. The cairns are made of turf, and are about forty yards apart, and serve to lead the caribou down to the lake.

Peace prevails in the settlement. An old woman is sitting in front of the tents peering out with eagles eyes across the flat valley. She has been sitting like this for several hours, almost motionless. Suddenly she jumps up crying, "Tuttu! Tuttu!" (Caribou! Caribou!) And the children immediately take up the same cry.

The camp is transformed. People tumble out of their tents and stand staring, while the hunters drop whatever they have in their hands, seize their guns, and dash off at full speed across the valley. 

There they are, a herd of about fifty caribou. Their grey-brown fur blends almost perfectly with the moss and marsh grass. They are going northeast at a good pace. The animals move forward lightly and gracefully over boulders and tussocks. The leader is a cow, then come several bulls with mightly antlers, and after them the rest. 

Here and there out in the flat valley and up the slopes toward the mountains I catch a glimpse of the Eskimo hunters. They are still running at full speed in different directions. Then they throw themselves to the ground and wait.

Suddenly the caribou herd stops as at a word of command; the animals stand dead still and gaze. The long row of cairns across their path rises out of the landscape as dark threatening objects. The beasts give a frightened start and run nervously now in one direction, now in another. Shots ring out, caribou fall. The herd is seized with panic and dashes off like the wind in the direction from which it came. More shots. Again the animals approach the caribou fence, but swing off sharply and hurry along it; not a single animal dares to pass between the cairns. At last the herd finds its way right out into the valley and continues northward at a high speed. 

It is not uncommon for herds to come so close to the camp; now and then the beasts start to swim across Raven Lake and are an easy prey. But what we shoot in the neighbourhood of the camp is quite insufficient. Sometimes we have to go a long way into the wide pass or in among the mountains. 

The Eskimos are masterly hunters. They train from boyhood and are still young when they bring down their first beast. To their own experience is added all the knowledge accumulated by generations: a comprehensive instinct for animal psychology. There are a multitude of things which are so accustomed to observe and work upon that they know what ought to be done without reasoning further. The hunters know how the caribou will react in given conditions, which route it will choose in accordance with the nature of the ground, where it will graze, and much else. Thus, they are able to place themselves favourably that they often get to close quarters with the herds.

As I wandered into this endless mountain world, I often stumbled upon old signs of caribou hunting--traces of vanished times. Along the slopes of the valley where the caribou have their tracks, I quite often came upon rows of little stone cairns. These were to lead the caribou to the spot where the marksman lay in wait with bow and arrows. At some places the hunters had built themselves stone screens, sometimes in a square like a small house without a roof.

On one beach a mass of caribou bones, half overgrown, lay strewn around. Here the beasts must have been driven into the water and then slaughtered from kayaks, being stabbed with a spear behind the last rib, close to the spine. The Eskimos have many stories of this kind of hunting, which was formely of great importance. Sometimes hundreds of animals were killed, and were usually divided equally between the families which took part in the drive.

The daughter of the house, the widow Paniulaq, had carried on with her work all the time without taking very much notice of what was going on. Then her four-year-old son woke up, threw the hides on one side, and sat up, with caribou hairs among his own dark locks. He suddenly became aware of his mother and caught hold of her. She bared her breast, and the sturdy boy began sucking, while the flow of words continued undisturbed.