new species
discovered at Point Barrow by the _Corwin_--and certainly no more dainty
game exists than the young wild geese and ptarmigan to be found in
countless numbers in Hotham inlet. At the latter place, doubtless the
warmest inside the straits, are found quantities of cranberries about
the size of a pea, which not only make a delicious accessory to roasted
goose, but act as a valuable antiscorbutic. These berries and a kind of
kelp, which I have seen Eskimo eating at Tapkan, Siberia, seem to be the
only vegetable food they have. The large quantities of eggs easily
procurable, but in most cases doubtful, also constitute a standard
article of diet among these people, who have no scruples about eating
them partly hatched. They seemed never to comprehend our fastidiousness
in the matter and why our tastes differed so much from theirs in this
respect. They will break an egg containing an embryonic duck or goose,
extract the bird by one leg and devour it with all the relish of an
epicure. Gull's eggs, however, are in disrepute among them, for the
women--who, by the way, have the same frailties and weaknesses as their
more civilized sisters--believe that eating gull's eggs causes loss of
beauty and brings on early decrepitude. The men, on the other hand, are
fond of seal eyes, a tid-bit which the women believe increases their
amorousness, and feed to their lords after the manner of "Open your
mouth and shut your eyes."

Game is, as a rule, very tame, and during the moulting season, when the
geese are unable to fly, it is quite possible to kill them with a stick.
At one place, Cape Thompson, Eskimo were seen catching birds from a high
cliff with a kind of scoop-net, and I saw birds at Herald island refuse
to move when pelted with stones, so unaccustomed were they to the
presence of man. In addition to being very tame, game is plentiful, and
it is not uncommon, off the Siberian coast, to see flocks of eider ducks
darkening the air and occupying several hours in passing overhead. It
was novel sport to see the natives throw a projectile known as an
"apluketat" into one of these flocks with astonishing range and
accuracy, bringing down the game with the effectiveness of a shotgun.

Game keeps so well in the Arctic that an instance is known of its being
perfectly sweet and sound on an English ship after two years' keeping,
and whalemen kill a number of pigs, which they hang in the rigging and
keep for use during the cruise. It