was not like thine, for there was no bite to the tongue nor tingling to the eyeballs, and of a truth it was water.  So we drank, and we drank overmuch; yet did we sit with cold hearts and solemn.  And Neewak was perplexed and a cloud came on his brow.  And he took Tummasook and Ipsukuk alone of all the company and set them apart, and bade them drink and drink and drink.  And they drank and drank and drank, and yet sat solemn and cold, till Tummasook arose in wrath and demanded back the furs and the tea he had paid.  And Ipsukuk raised her voice, thin and angry.  And the company demanded back what they had given, and there was a great commotion.’

“‘Does the son of a dog deem me a whale?’ demanded Tummasook, shoving back the skin flap and standing erect, his face black and his brows angry.  ’Wherefore I am filled, like a fish-bladder, to bursting, till I can scarce walk, what of the weight within me.  Lalah!  I have drunken as never before, yet are my eyes clear, my knees strong, my hand steady.’

“‘The shaman cannot send us to sleep with the gods,’ the people complained, stringing in and joining us, ’and only in thy igloo may the thing be done.’

“So I laughed to myself as I passed the hooch around and the guests made merry.  For in the flour I had traded to Neewak I had mixed much soda that I had got from the woman Ipsukuk.  So how could his brew ferment when the soda kept it sweet?  Or his hooch be hooch when it would not sour?

“After that our wealth flowed in without let or hindrance.  Furs we had without number, and the fancy-work of the women, all of the chief’s tea, and no end of meat.  One day Moosu retold for my benefit, and sadly mangled, the story of Joseph in Egypt, but from it I got an idea, and soon I had half the tribe at work building me great meat caches.  And of all they hunted I got the lion’s share and stored it away.  Nor was Moosu idle.  He made himself a pack of cards from birch bark, and taught Neewak the way to play seven-up.  He also inveigled the father of Tukeliketa into the game.  And one day he married the maiden, and the next day he moved into the shaman’s house, which was the finest in the village.  The fall of Neewak was complete, for he lost all his possessions, his walrus-hide drums, his incantation tools—­everything.  And in the end he became a hewer of wood and drawer of water at the beck and call of Moosu.  And Moosu—­he set himself up as shaman, or high priest, and out of his garbled Scripture created new gods and made incantation before strange altars.

“And I was well pleased, for I thought it good that church and state go hand in hand, and I had certain plans of my own concerning the state.  Events were shaping as I had foreseen.  Good temper and smiling faces had vanished from the village.  The people were morose and sullen.  There were quarrels and fighting, and things were in an uproar night and day.  Moosu’s cards were duplicated