Iron County register., 1882-11-30
The Point Barrow Esquimaux.

The natives who maintain a ratber
arduous struggle for existence at Point
barrow and its immediate neiohbor.
hood belong to the Esquimaux race.
They are called Inntlits, from the word
'1nnuit, which, in their language,
means man, the plural of which is
s'innuine," meaning men or people.
Although there is great resemblance be.
tween all the subdivisions of the Esoui.
maux race, there is vet considerable dis
parity existing between the various fam.
lies, both in language and manners.
depending. no doubt, on the accidental
circumstances of locality, surroundings.
etc. The language of an Eastern Es.
qulmaux would be entirely uninrellieibIe
TO native of the western coast: and
even the native of one side of BEHRING'S
STRAITS speaks dialect differing con-
slderably from that of the other side.
Ihere are, in fact, many more points
OF similarity between all the natives of
the eastern side of the BEHRING'S Sea
than there are between them and any of
the natives of the opposite side-thus
the natives of the Diomedes differ more
IN language and. dress from the natives
OF East Cape, only twenty miles awav,
tnan the natives of Point Barrow do
from those of Golowin Bay in Norton
Sound, seven hundred or eight hundred
miles to the northward. The natives of
the American side are, on the whole,
superior to those on the Asiatic-better
looking, more intelligent, and more
cieam looking, where cleanliness, of
course, only means lesser degree of
hlthiness-and the natives of Point Bar.
row are trifle superior to any of the
uati yes we have seen at any other point
On the American side.
1t seems to be a universal law that the
savage deteriorates when he comes in
contact with civilization, and the longer
the contact the more abject he becomes,
and no one passing along the coast of
Behring's Sea and of the Arctic Ocean to
Point Barrows can fail to be struck by
the clear exemplification of this law.
There seems to be a strong tendency in
savage man everywhere to acquire the
bad habits of the civilized, rather than
the good, whenever the two races come
in contact, and the Esauimaux race is
no exception to the rule. Thus the
natives of Point Barrow, having, until
recently, had but little intercourse with
the white man, seem to have deteriorat-
ed less than the tribes to the southwark,
and are quite respectable people for saw
ages. They are rather a good-looking
people, with interesting, intelligent, but
not very handsome faces. In general,
their noses are too flat and the complex
ions too coopery for beauty. Their
bodies are well formed, not at all chunky,
and of average stature; their hands and
feet are smaller and better formed than
those of the average white man, and, if
they had laid aside one or two rather
nasty ha bits and learned to wash them
selves occasionally, they might be con-
sidered tolerably handsome.
The women are more intelligent and
better looking than the men, and are
treated with more consideration than
among most savages. Still the man is
the lord and master, and his wife or his
daughters have no rights that he is
bound to respect by any code of law or
morals existing among them. A woman
can not choose her husband, but is Civ
en- away much the same as COW or a
horse is, and her husband can beat her
or put her away, or sell her at pleasure,
except she may happen to have more
friends than he has, and then it may not
be altogether safe for him to exercise his
lordly attributes too fully. Self-interest,
however, and the. indolent, easy-going
habits of these people, prevent much
harshness to exist in the relations be-
tween husband and wife, for the females
of marriageable age are seldom in ex-
cess of the males, and consequently
there is really little choice allowed, and,
besides, it is imperative that every man
shall have wife if possible, because an
Innuit without one is about as forlorn
and helpless an Individual as can well
be imagined. There is no such thing as
marriage ceremony. The whole affair
is bargain, and of no mere Importance
than any other bargain. No morality,
in the proper sense of the term, exists,
nothing instrinsically right or wrong.
individuals have got rights. if they are
able to maintain them, so that really
might is the great arbiter of right, ex-
cept in such cases as superstition steps
in and exerts a regulating influence over
conduct. Notwithstanding all this, the
social relations are carried on as smooth
ly, and with as little injustice. as among
c;v;l;zed peonle Chr Boston Herald.