Some of our Winter Island friends had now arrived also, being the party who left us there towards the end of the preceding May, and whom we had afterward overtaken on their journey to the northward.  They were certainly all very glad to see us again, and, throwing off the Esquimaux for a time, shook us heartily by the hand, with every demonstration of sincere delight.  Ewerat, in his quiet, sensible way, which was always respectable, gave us a circumstantial account of every event of his journey.  On his arrival at Owlitteweek, near which island we overtook him, he had buried the greater part of his baggage under heaps of stones, the ice no longer being fit for dragging the sledge upon.  Here also he was happily eased of a still greater burden, by the death of his idiot boy, who thus escaped the miseries to which a longer life must, among these people, have inevitably exposed him.  As for that noisy little fellow, “John Bull” (Kooillitiuk), he employed almost the whole of his first visit in asking every one, by name, “How d’ye do, Mr. So and So?” a question which had obtained him great credit among our people at Winter Island.  Being a very important little personage, he also took great pride in pointing out various contrivances on board the ships, and explaining to the other Esquimaux their different uses, to which the latter did not fail to listen with all the attention due to so knowing an oracle.

CHAPTER XIII.

Preparations for the Winter.—­Various Meteorological Phenomena to the close of the year 1822.—­Sickness among the Esquimaux.—­Meteorological Phenomena to the end of March.

November.—­The measures now adopted for the security of the ships and their stores, for the maintenance of economy, cleanliness, and health, and for the prosecution of the various observations and experiments, being principally the same as those already detailed in the preceding winter’s narrative, I shall be readily excused for passing them over in silence.

The daily visits of the Esquimaux to the ships throughout the winter afforded, both to officers and men, a fund of constant variety and never-failing amusement, which no resources of our own could possibly have furnished.  Our people were, however, too well aware of the advantage they derived from the schools not to be desirous of their re-establishment, which accordingly took place soon after our arrival at Igloolik; and they were glad to continue this as their evening occupation during the six succeeding months.

The year closed with the temperature of -42 deg., the mean of the month of December having been 27 deg. 8’, which, taken in connexion with that of November, led us to expect a severe winter.