until he can pay up. But if the debtor dies in the meantime, the creditor never makes any claim. This,' adds Dalager, 'is an inconvenient habit for the merchants of the colony, who are always bound to give credit; whereof I have had several experiences, especially this year, many of my debtors having departed this life, and thus brought me into considerable perplexity.'
On his complaining to 'some influential and reasonable Greenlanders,' they advised him 'to register his claim at once, but to let the man's lice die in the grave (as they expressed it) before he proceeded to execution.'
Beyond the articles above enumerated,[1] the Greenlander, according to his primitive customs, can possess but little. Even if he had a faculty for laying up riches, which he very seldom has, his needier fellows would have the right to enforce a claim upon such of his possessions as were not necessary for himself. Thus we find in Greenland this unfortunate state of things: that the European immigrants, who are in reality supported by the natives, often become rich and live in abundance (at any rate, according to the Eskimo ideas), while the natives themselves are in want.
- ↑ Dogs, however, must be added to the list, and, in the case of the North and East Greenlanders, dog-sledges.
