ed the mists,
and the mighty storms that sent the sea rolling in upon the cliffs in
summer. He never ceased to marvel at the aurora borealis, which by
night flashed over the heavens in wondrous streams of fire and lighted
the darkened world. His father told him the aurora borealis was the
spirits of their departed people dancing in the sky. He learned the
ways of the wild things in sea and on land and never tired of
following the tracks of beasts in the snow, or of watching the seals
sunning themselves on rocks or playing about in the water.

The big wolf dogs were his special delight. His father kept nine of
them, and many an exciting ride Pomiuk had behind them when his father
took him on the komatik to hunt seals or to look at fox traps, or to
visit the Trading Post.

When he was a wee lad his father made for him a small dog whip of
braided walrus hide. This was Pomiuk's favorite possession. He
practiced wielding it, until he became so expert he could flip a
pebble no larger than a marble with the tip end of the long lash; and
he could snap and crack the lash with a report like a pistol shot.

As he grew older and stronger he practiced with his father's whip,
until he became quite as expert with that as with his own smaller one.
This big whip had a wooden handle ten inches in length, and a supple
lash of braided walrus hide thirty-five feet long. The lash was about
an inch in diameter where it joined the handle, tapering to a thin tip
at the end.

One summer day, when Pomiuk was ten years of age, a strange ship
dropped anchor off the rocky shore where Pomiuk's father and several
other Eskimo families had pitched their tupeks, while they fished in
the sea near by for cod or hunted seals. A boat was launched from the
ship, and as it came toward the shore all of the excited Eskimos from
the tupeks, men, women and children, and among them Pomiuk, ran down
to the landing place to greet the visitors, and as they ran every one
shouted, "Kablunak! Kablunak!" which meant, "Stranger! Stranger!"

Some white men and an Eskimo stepped out of the boat, and in the
hospitable, kindly manner of the Eskimo Pomiuk's father and Pomiuk and
their friends greeted the strangers with handshakes and cheerful
laughter, and said "Oksunae" to each as he shook his hand, which is
the Eskimo greeting, and means "Be strong."

The Eskimo that came with the ship was from an Eskimo settlement
called Karwalla, in Hamilton Inlet, on the east of La