It proved a difficult task, for the Eskimo tongue was both very simple and very complex.  In all the things pertaining to their daily life it was exceedingly complex.  For instance, to catch one kind of fish was expressed by one word, to catch another kind in quite different terms.  They had one word for catching a young seal, another for catching an old one.  When it came to matters of moral and spiritual import, the language was poor to desperation.  Egede’s instruction began when he caught the word “kine”—­what is it?  And from that time on he learned every day; but the pronunciation was as varied as the workaday vocabulary, and it was an unending task.

It proceeded with many interruptions from the Angekoks, who tried more than once to bewitch him, but finally gave it up, convinced that he was a great medicine-man himself, and therefore invulnerable.  But before that they tried to foment a regular mutiny, the colony being by that time well under way, and Egede had to arrest and punish the leaders.  The natives naturally clung to them, and when Egede had mastered their language and tried to make clear that the Angekoks deceived them when they pretended to go to the other world for advice, they demurred.  “Did you ever see them go?” he asked.  “Well, have you seen this God of yours of whom you speak so much?” was their reply.  When Egede spoke of spiritual gifts, they asked for good health and blubber:  “Our Angekoks give us that.”  Hell-fire was much in theological evidence in those days, but among the Eskimos it was a failure as a deterrent.  They listened to the account of it eagerly and liked the prospect.  When at length they became convinced that Egede knew more than their Angekoks, they came to him with the request that he would abolish winter.  Very likely they thought that one who had such knowledge of the hot place ought to have influence enough with the keeper of it to obtain this favor.

It was not an easy task, from any point of view, to which he had put his hands.  As that first winter wore away there were gloomy days and nights, and they were not brightened when, with the return of the sun, no ship arrived from Denmark.  The Dutch traders came, and opened their eyes wide when they found Egede and his household safe and even on friendly terms with the Eskimos.  Pelesse—­the natives called the missionary that, as the nearest they could come to the Danish praest (priest)—­Pelesse was not there after blubber, they told the Dutchmen, but to teach them about heaven and of “Him up there,” who had made them and wanted them home with Him again.  So he had not worked altogether in vain.  But the brief summer passed, and still no relief ship.  The crew of Haabet clamored to go home, and Egede had at last to give a reluctant promise that if no ship came in two weeks, he would break up.  His wife alone refused to take a hand in packing.  The ship was coming, she insisted, and at the last moment it did come.  A boat arriving after dark brought the first word of it.  The people ashore heard voices speaking in Danish, and flew to Egede, who had gone to bed, with the news.  The ship brought good cheer.  The Government was well disposed.  Trading and preaching were to go on together, as planned.  Joyfully then they built a bigger and a better house, and called their colony Godthaab (Good Hope).