the apology for any act revolting to moral sense. He was first harpooned, then
disembowelled; a flap letdown from his forehead “to cover his eyes and prevent
his seeing again”—he had, it appears, the repute of an evil eye; and then small
portions of his heart were eaten, to ensure that he should not come back to earth
unchanged.
When an Eskimo has injured any one of his countrymen,—has cut his seal-lines,
or lamed his dogs, or burned his bladder-float—or perpetrated some equally
grievous offence—the angekok summons him to meet the countryside before the
tribunal of the hunapok. The friends of the parties, and the idlers for miles
around, assemble about the justice-seat; it may be at some little cluster of huts,
or, if the weather permit, in the open air. The accuser rises, and strikes a few
discords with a seal-rib on a tom-tom or drum. “He then passes to the charge,
and pours out in long paragraphic words all the abuse and ridicule to which his
outrageous vernacular can give expression. The accused meanwhile is silent; but,
as the orator pauses after a signal hit, or to flourish a cadence on his musical
instrument, the whole audience, friends, neutrals, and opponents signalise their
approval by outcries as harmonious as those we sometimes hear in our town
meetings at home. Stimulated by the applause, and warming with his own fires,
the accuser renews the attack, his eloquence becoming more and more licentious
and vituperative, until it has exhausted either his strength or his vocabulary of
invective. Now comes the accused, with defence, and counter-charge, and
retorted abuse; the assembly still listening and applauding through a lengthened
session. The Homeric debate at a close, the angekoks hold a powwow, and a
penalty is denounced against the accused for his guilt, or the accuser for his
unsustained prosecution.”