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272
ESKIMO LIFE

legends are to be found among the Eskimos of Baffinsland,[1] and also on the north coast of Alaska; though there they refer to the Indians alone, not to the Europeans. Analogous myths of descent from dogs (or wolves, or bears) occur among many races, Aryan as well as Mongolian or American.[2] They lie at the root of the mythology of many Indian tribes, who hold that the first woman took a dog to mate, and that they themselves are descended from this connection. It seems to me evident that the Eskimos have taken their legend from this source, and that they originally applied it to the Indians alone. When, subsequently, they fell in with another strange race (the Europeans), they extended it so as to account for them also. It is noteworthy that the shoe which turns into a ship occurs in the Baffinsland versions as well.

The Eskimos, according to some authorities, trace the origin of death to a woman who once said: 'Let people gradually die, or else there will be no room for them in the world.' Others believe that two of the first human beings quarrelled, the one saying 'Let there be day and night and let men die.' the other 'Let there be night alone, and let

  1. Rink and Boas, Journal of American Folklore (1888?) p. 124.
  2. F. Liebrecht, Zur Volkskunde, 1879, pp. 17-25; J. C. Müller, Geschichte der americanischen Urreligionen, pp. 134, 65.