I

Time To Leave

After one year, in the month Naisearseavick (June), it was time for Ekeuhnick to prepare for a long distance journey. The people had learned many things to help them live in the changed world. They could keep warm in their houses; they had skin clothes to cover their bodies, and they were using their minds to prepare for cold times when the plants and animals were scarce.

Ekeuhnick looked around for a companion. He had to find a man almost his same age who would be a partner to him because he was smart and would make a good helper. He found a strong young man to go with him. He was named Seelameu, which means “floating in space.” They talked over the coming journey. On the first quarter of the moon, Ekeuhnick would leave with his companion for the mountain far in the east.

Ekeuhnick called his people. When they gathered, he told them what he was going to do. He also told them they must learn to do some things in better ways. He told his people what he had learned from the old prophet. He told them they would have to hold some sort of meetings. They would need to talk over ways of improvement for themselves in future living when the land changes. They would have to become industrious. They would have to make tools so they could make nets and traps for the fishes, traps and snares for the animals, and all the things they needed for their houses like bags and pouches for storing food, preparing skins to make clothes, and weapons to hunt the animals. He told them they would have to work hard in time to come. He told them when the time comes, he had to do what Aungayoukuksuk wanted him to do to help them.

He said: “Aungayoukuksuk wants me to take one other man and go to that mountain which lays to the east of here and investigate it for you people.” Then he told them about the plans he and Seelameu had made.

“We want you to know that we may stay one whole year, twelve months, before we come home. You have the calendar to help you know what to do and to know when we may come back. Remember what Aungayoukuksuk said and what has already changed. He told that the sun and moon will run together. He said the moon will hide the sun after many earthquakes. After the earthquakes are over, the sun will not shine for three days. After that happens, the sun will go farther away from our country every year, and it will get colder. The warm climate will shorten each year.

“It is colder now. We have seen some cold times and then it gets warmer, but not so warm as before. It will get colder and colder each cold time that comes. It will be harder to live, to stay warm, and to find food. Aungayoukuksuk told of a land beyond the mountain in the east where there is plenty for us to use even in cold times. Let all of us look forward to finding an easier and better living for ourselves and the generations to come after us. This is the beginning of a change for our people. We must all help each other.”

II

Beginning the Journey

At the quarterly moon it was time for Ekeuhnick and his companion, Seelameu, to start from this home country to the destination. His way was through a land of no men, straight east, toward the mountain far away in the distance.

The two men started to get ready for morning. The partners left their homes shortly after daylight. The cold raw wind that had been southerly for days had blown itself out. Turning toward the mountain which Aungayoukuksuk had pointed out to Ekeuhnick and wanted him to investigate, the men began walking east. Soon they found themselves moving across a great rolling brush-covered plain that stretched out before them in the distance. Once the men started across the country they learned lots of ways to live off the land and many ways to cross the creeks and rivers.

They began to use some of the new resources in this country in times when they needed them. Each day they moved about. When the weather was bad, occasionally they took their time moving on. Almost every time they came to a new place they found something they would have to find a way to catch, or to change it so they could use it. In this way they learned to make and set squirrel, ptarmigan, rabbit, and duck snares. They found out that every snare had to be set right in order for the animal they wanted to get caught. Those two men had to try out every snare to learn to make it work correctly. Doing this made them slow on their journey because they had to experiment to find whichever way was the best way to use all the resources of the new country.

Every step they moved ahead toward their destination they investigated every place they came to. Everything they saw was new. It was important to go through all the different parts of the land. They found many new plants, birds, animals, rocks, minerals, and growing things that they did not know about. They did not know if they were useful or not. They looked at everything and experimented with what they found. They enjoyed everything they made from ideas that came to use natural things. They figured out how to work with the natural things they found with the help of the Power of Imagination. Gradually, as they traveled on they became more expert at adapting the things they found to tools, equipment, and weapons that would help their people live in the changed times.

Ekeuhnick was very much amazed by what they saw and the things they learned. Everything away from home was different. Whenever they moved on there were more things to see and to find uses for.

Ekeuhnick and his companion passed around beyond the big mountain Aungayoukuksuk had pointed to when he sat by the springs. There the men found a land of plenty without any people living there. It lay inland, east of the shore of straits of the sea. Ekeuhnick saw it would be a land that would be supporting people from generation to generation.

Now Ekeuhnick began to see why the prophet pointed out to him to go to the east and find a place for his people to inhabit. Still, Ekeuhnick wondered: “How did Aungayoukuksuk teach him and tell him about things that will be happening?” Now, as the old man said, he had found this land. It was a place abundant with birds, animals, and fishes of all kinds. In Ekeuhnick’s eyes it was a great land to live by.

Ekeuhnick was thinking a lot. “It will be a new life with new ways to live. People will change.”

It was like someone was teaching new knowledge to him as he thought of the many ways living would be different. Their new way of living must come soon. They must become wise. It would not be so easy for them. Ekeuhnick remembered the words of Aungayoukuksuk telling him: “People will see. All will change. The earth, weather, everything will change and become cold.” Ekeuhnick was willing to lead his people from the old way of living into new ways of life. There would be no more paradise.

III

New Ways in a New Land

All of the time passing during their journey those two men, Ekeuhnick and Seelameu, found a lot of things to think about. They were always trying new ideas that came when they looked at the land and growing things around them. More and more they used the Power of Imagination.

They were all alone in the wilderness and no one bothered them. They could look around and take their time to see everything. They had to think a lot about the plants and animals and how their people could live by the different parts of the land they saw. Whatever they found, or the new sights they saw, they talked about to each other. They would make a plan to try out a new idea. They talked about the trees and plants; the rocks, rivers, and creeks; and the birds, animals, and fishes. They discussed how many there were of each kind. They wondered and thought about how they would be useful to help their people live a better life. They wondered how birds and animals and plants would taste as food. They talked about the bones and other parts of the living things and how they could be used. They looked at the trees and bushes and grasses and talked about how people could use them to make life easier than the way it was for those they left behind.

Whenever an idea came up, they talked about it to each other and then they tried it out. Together they would experiment with an idea until it worked right. One would say something will work a certain way. The other would say it could work another way. Then they would plan how to try both ways and find out. This is how they worked together. They found it was easier to do things together. Each time, the things they made and the ideas they tried got better and better until they found the best method and they both agreed this was the one to use.

When Ekeunick and Seelameu were away from their camp and looking over the land around them, they talked about what they were doing and what they would do next. They talked over their ideas about the things they were making and how they would try those ideas when they got back to camp. Their brains were always working now. Sooner or later, after one man had thought out a new idea or plan, he would talk it over with the other. Then, they both worked on it, no matter what the idea was. They were both learning many things they never knew before.

Here are some of the ideas they talked about and some of the useful things they invented to help their people live by the new lands they would come to occupy.

Drying Fish

Once, when the men came to a river, there were lots of salmon and smaller fish in the water. Ekeuhnick never saw so many fish before. He cut a long water willow stick. He shaped one end to a point and speared a salmon with it. They roasted that salmon and ate it for supper. Seelameu asked Ekeuhnick, “What would you do with a lot of fish if you caught them all at one time?”

Ekeuhnick had been thinking about that. He told Seelameu, “I would cut them up the middle from the head to the tail and hang them on a pole to dry.” Then he said, “You go spear one salmon for me so I can cut it and hang it up. We will try it at noon-time tomorrow.”

Seelameu got hold of the willow spear, went to the river and came back with one salmon. Ekeuhnick cut the salmon in two long halves, washed it, and hung it with the meat side turned out over the limb of a tree. The next morning the fish was half-dry. Ekeuhnick put it in his pack sack. At mid-day, he took it out. It was not spoiled and looked good. The men cooked it over a little fire. It sure tasted good, and they enjoyed it.

They talked over what they had learned. The fish stayed good longer if it was half-dried. It was easy to take along on a trip and they did not have to find something to eat while they were traveling. They decided it would be handy to have half-dry fish when bad weather comes. They saw dried fish could be kept on hand for stormy and rainy weather or when there were not so many fish in the rivers.

Snares

Ekeuhnick and Seelameu learned to make rope out of caribou skins. They learned how to make small ropes (thongs) and thin lines (strings). They learned to make the different sizes when they needed them for the ideas they got about making snares, snowshoes, and when they needed to tie things up for packing and carrying. As they continued on their journey, collecting many things to take back to their people, they learned more and more useful ways to use the strips of caribou skins and other animals.

They soon found out how to cut round and round an animal skin to have one long single piece of skin. Sometimes the string was not strong enough to do what they wanted it to. They tried twisting and braiding strips of skin together. This made the strips much stronger. Soon Ekeuhnick and Seelameu could make ropes, thongs, and strings to do many different jobs.

They made a plan to catch caribou in summer time without hunting them one at a time. Whenever they walked around they saw caribou trails. The trails led to the creeks or the banks of the rivers. The caribou always seemed to follow the same trails to drink water. The men sat down and made a strong rope out of male caribou skin. They braided four strings into one strong rope. After the rope was done, Seelameu asked, “How are we going to put this so it will catch a caribou?”

Ekeuhnick told him, “We must put a loop in the rope big enough so when the caribou comes into the loop, the horns can go all the way through. When the caribou’s head goes all the way through the hole the loop must grab the neck of the caribou so it cannot get away. The caribou will have to stay in the snare until we catch him.”

The men went to one of the narrow creeks coming down from a hill. Here the water willows were growing very high. The caribou path went through the tall willows. The men thought this would be a good place to put a snare.

Ekeuhnick and Seelameu set the caribou snare by tying one end of the rope to the biggest water willow they could find. They let the loop hang down in the path with a big enough hole so a caribou head with all the horn could go through. Then the men went back to camp.

The next day when the men went to the creek, a big caribou was caught in the snare. Their plan had worked fine.

The caribou snare worked so well, Ekeuhnick and Seelameu thought about other things that could be caught in snares. They experimented until they found ways to snare squirrels, rabbits, ptarmigan, and the birds that swam on the small lakes and shallow rivers. They learned they could catch anything with a snare if it was the right size and set in the right place.

Ekeuhnick and Seelameu had not yet reached the big mountain they were looking for, but they had learned many new things to help their people. They would be able to tell them about easier ways to harvest food, ways to store food for times of bad weather or when hunting was not good, and how to make and use many kinds of snares.

IV

The Mountain

Ekeuhnick and Seelameu were always looking for a better country for their people to occupy. They traveled through the land of no men. They traveled and traveled until the mountain began to come closer. They still had not seen enough worthwhile land to make life better for their people. Finally, they came to the land of the big mountain.

The men climbed all the way to the top of the great mountain. Finally, they stopped to rest. They sat down on some warm rocks. They could see all of the new country spread out below the mountain. It was like a great bowl with a very wide bottom. They saw many lakes. Three or four big rivers flowed into the basin. All of the rivers flowed into a big lake. The big mountain Aungayoukuksuk told Ekeuhnick to find was on the south side of the lake and stood up from east to west.

As the men looked at the big lake below them, Ekeuhnick broke the silence. Looking at the land below, he said, “Do you see what I see?”

“Yes,” replied Seelameu.

“What do you think of what you see?” asked Ekeuhnick.

Seelameu studied the country below. “We must go down there and explore that place. We must see what kind of country that is.”

Ekeuhnick pointed down the mountainside. “Look!” he said. Seelameu turned his eyes to the place Ekeuhnick pointed to and saw a great herd of caribou feeding around. Some of them were laying down. Seelameu smiled.

“I have never seen so many caribou in my life,” he said.

The men began pointing out all the sights to each other. There were lots of birds flying in flocks like small clouds around the lakes. One bunch of birds landed on a lake. It seemed like there was an island in the lake there were so many birds resting there.

Ekeuhnick said, “Here is a place for people to stay. Let us go down this mountain and see what the rivers and the land look like.”

V

The Hot and Cold Rivers

The men traveled for many hours. First they had to go through lots of trees. They were cottonwoods. Ekeuhnick and Seelameu came to a large river. They saw there were many salmon going up the river. They crossed over at a shallow place and went on through the cottonwood forest. Soon they came to a small stream. Seelameu said, “I am thirsty.”

He bent down to drink. The water was so hot he jumped up and looked at Ekeuhnick with wide eyes. He finally found his voice and was able to say, “That is very hot water.”

Ekeuhnick bent down and tested the water with his finger. It sure was hot. It almost burned. The men did not know what to say about this. After a little time they turned and went back the way they came.

The land they passed through had many ponds, sloughs, and lakes. Still they walked on. They saw lots of game. They saw seals playing in the big lake. They saw lots of different fishes in the lake and in the rivers. There were many kinds of birds flying in the early morning times. Fishes in the rivers jumped all over. There were caribou everywhere in the hills. They found more kinds of berries than they had ever seen in one place before. They found blueberries, black berries, and salmon berries. There were bears in the mountains, and squirrels and other small animals were living everywhere. It seemed as if they had found a perfect place in many ways. Still, they did not feel satisfied. They had not yet found just what they were looking for as a place for their people to live.

Some time later they went back to the place of hot water. They found the sand along the bank was warm to lay upon. Lots of grass and flowers were growing along the creek. The water was so hot in places it was boiling. They stopped in a good place and made a fire. They roasted some caribou meat and ate. Both of the men had been thinking about what they had seen.

Ekeuhnick said, “Now, if our people could see this place, some of them would like it very much for their future place for making a living. We must do more than just look over this basin. We must explore this whole country around here. We may have found a country of a warmer climate. It may be that the whole world is the same around us. The rest of the land may be just like what we can see here. No matter where we go, it is a warmer place than where our people are now.”

The sand was warm by the hot water creek. They laid down to sleep out the night. Next day, they left that place and went to the river where they had crossed before. They speared two fish and went on across the river. They were hungry and did not want to carry the heavy fish, so they decided to try a new way of cooking the fish while they rested. They dug a pit in the sand. They put leaves in the bottom of the pit, and laid the salmon on top of them. Then they put more leaves on top of the fish, and covered it all up with sand. Then they built a fire on top of the covered-up fish. A little later when the fire went out, they took the roasted fish out of the pit. Those fish sure tasted good and it was an easy way to cook.

After they ate, they followed their plan to do some more exploring. They decided to look at the country north of them. They saw lots of hills. Soon they came to a country that had big fir trees. They could not see any farther past this forest. They had found lots of game and many kinds of fishes in the rivers as they passed by. They had covered lots of country and summer time was almost over. They decided they had traveled far enough north from the place of hot water.

VI

Winter Comes

Soon the weather was changing. It was getting cool at night. Then it began to frost up during the night, but when the sun came up the frost melted away. Ekeuhnick and Seelameu decided they had to plan to winter somewhere. One of them said, “We must go back to the hot water creek. There is a lot of game around there and it will be warmer.”

The men turned back toward the hot springs. When they arrived they prepared to stay for the winter. They built an igloo (a shelter place). They took cottonwood poles and bent and tied them to make a frame. Then they took skins of caribou and covered the poles to make a tent. Next they took pieces of sod they cut from the ground and covered the tent. This would keep them warm when the wind blew and it was cold.

The men kept experimenting with their ideas on ways to catch the small animals and birds. They thought up ways of making clothes to keep the cold from hurting their bodies. They made their first parkas out of rabbit skins. They made boots for their feet out of caribou heads. The boots showed the nose, mouth, and eyes. When the mouth opening was sewed shut, a man’s foot stayed nice and warm, and the bottom of the caribou jaw made the sole of the boot. The boot was lined with dry grass and made it easier to walk on the stony places. The men made mittens out of muskrat skins. Later on they made parkas and pants from caribou skin. They experimented with the caribou skin and found a way to make covers for their bodies to keep off the rain. They took off the hair so they would not be too warm.

All through the winter time they talked and planned, and tried out different ideas for using the things they had found in this new land where no men lived.

The men found out how to catch fish by a hook. One man looked through the ice in the river in the fall season when the young ice froze over the river. He saw a pike swimming up and it caught a minnow and swallowed it. When Seelameu got back to the camp, while he ate his supper, he told Ekeuhnick about the fish, and the pike eating the minnow. He said, “I wonder how I can fool them with something to get them.” His companion said, “Well, that is easy. All you have to do is make a hook some way with rawhide on the hook.” The man said, “I can make a hook out of bone. It must be long enough so when the fish swallows it, it will get across the fish’s mouth. With the string tied to the middle of the bone the fish could be pulled up. I could bait the hook with a piece of fish or meat.”

The men also used a piece of caribou horn and put a string in the middle. Then they tied a piece of meat around it. They could leave it in a hole in the ice with the string tied to a long pole across the ice. In the morning there would be a big fish on the hook. Later, people used ivory to make hooks, too.

Those two men learned that it was a good idea always to carry a spear and their bow and arrows when they went hunting.

Ekeuhnick and Seelameu found caribou everywhere they went. They always hunted them because they could be used for so many things besides eating. They found that the meat tasted good dried or frozen as well as cooked. It was the same with the many kinds of fishes. They decided that rabbit and ptarmigan had to be cooked to be good to eat.

Those men looked for better or easier ways to cook their food. They decided to try making pots or bowls out of clay they found near camp. They took the sticky wet clay and shaped it with their hands so it would be useful to hold or cook their food when it was dry. The first things they made were not so good. They did not last. They tried adding different things to the clay like grass or feathers. Soon they learned to make good pots and bowls that would last. Later on, when the dark times of winter came, they found out they could put caribou fat or fish oil in a clay dish with some twisted grass it and it would burn for a long time. They could use this for a lamp or even to cook their food.

When the snow came and covered the ground, Ekeuhnick and Seelameu found it was very hard to walk around to check their traps and snares or hunt. They saw that the rabbits did not sink in the deep snow. They looked at their tracks and wondered why their feet did not break the soft surface of the snow. They talked it over. Ekeuhnick remembered the spider web and how he had made a net to catch fishes by using knotted strings. He took willow s trips and wove them together and tied them with strings of caribou skin. He tied them to his feet. They made tracks that looked something like the ones made by the rabbits. After he and Seelameu tried a few times, they found a way to make the flat baskets for their feet that would keep them from breaking through the snow. They had made snowshoes and they sure made it easier to travel and hunt.

The men decided to try another way to catch fish. They thought about how they could trap and snare the animals on the land. They talked about ways to trap fish, too. They took willow sticks and tied them with thongs of caribou skin. They made a big cage with them and left one edge of the cage with a big open place. Then they made the opening narrower and narrower as it went farther inside the cage. Pretty soon it got so small, when the fish went through it into the cage, he could not find it and get out again. Seelameu and Ekeuhnick put the trap under the ice in one of the bigger rivers. They fastened it so it would not get lost and pointed the opening against the current. This trap worked very well and soon those men caught more fish than they could use right away. They laid the fish on the ice and they froze hard. Later on, the men tasted the frozen fish and they were good to eat. They decided they would keep them near camp when they were frozen. This way they would have a lot of fish to eat when it was bad weather and they could not hunt.

So, Ekeuhnick and his companion lived through that winter in the country by the big mountain where men had never lived before. The sun began to get warmer and the early spring weather came. They hunted then while the caribou were fawning. They got enough fawns to get skins to use for the light parkas they needed for late spring time and summer and for boots to cover their feet. The soft fawn skins make very warm, dry boots.

The two explorers were very successful with their experiment all through the fall and winter time. During the stormy weather they sat in their camp and talked about going back to their people. They talked about how they could show them the things they had made and tell about the useful animals and materials of the country of the mountain. They would be able to bring back many things and new ideas to make living better and easier for everyone. They discussed the different things used for summer and winter seasons and how there were ways of doing things that worked best during the different seasons.

They talked about how they would get back to their people. They began to plan the best way to travel. They talked about making a boat. First they planned it all out in their minds and talked it over. Then they started to work to design the kind of boat they would need.

When the weather began to get warmer, they cut long water willows and peeled the outside bark away. They let the sun dry the willows before the spring came. Soon they had many long willow poles drying by their camp. They looked among the cottonwoods and found long strong trees. They cut these and fixed them the same way as the willow poles. They would use these for the frame of the boat. They put lots of caribou skins to soak in water. This let the hair come off the skins. They could use these hides to cover the frame of cottonwood and willow. They planned to make a skin covered boat — an umiak. As soon as the snow went away and the ice began to melt, Ekeuhnick and Seelameu planned to build their boat.

VII

Spring Comes

Soon the spring weather came. The sun was getting warm and the snow was melting. Birds of all kinds were coming to the country. Canadian geese were flying all over. Ekeuhnick and Seelameu began to make the skin boat according to their plan. The willows and cottonwoods were ready to put together. They had lots of caribou raw hide strings, thongs, and ropes ready to bind the joints together. Soon the frame was finished. Next they sewed the skins together with thongs. They used many caribou skins because the boat was large. It was long and wide for they had lots of things to take home to show the people.

While the men were sewing the hides together they saw that the caribou skin ropes would not be strong enough for all the lashings to make the boat. They decided they would have to kill a bear to use. They must have this stronger hide to make ropes and thongs to bind the skin cover to the boat and to tie it inside to fasten it to the frame. They got a bear and cut the skin into heavy strong strips. They kept the sewed skins in water until they were ready to put them on the wood framework. This kept the skins soft. They made holes all along the outside edge of the big cover made from the caribou hides while the skins were still very wet. Next they pulled the cover tight over the frame and fastened it to the top of the boat with the bear hide rope. It was still very wet. After the skin cover was tightly bound to the boat frame, the boat was ready to use. All those men had to do was wait until the skin cover dried.

That boat sure looked good and strong to Ekeuhnick and Seelameu. They were proud of it. They smiled at each other. They made paddles out of cottonwood while the skin cover was drying. Now, the boat was done.

They put samples of things they had found and all the things they had made that were successful and useful into the boat. That boat was really loaded when they finished. They had a load of new and strange things to make life better to show to the people they had left many months ago.

VIII

The Way Back

A few days later Ekeuhnick and Seelameu started down the river in the umiak. They planned to go down the river, across the big lake they saw from the mountain, and follow a river to the ocean. They would use the sun to guide them back to their people. Their journey would be a long trip. Ekeuhnick and his companion expected to explore and learn about the country as they traveled. They wanted to find more useful things to make life better and easier. They wanted to do this for their people, not for themselves.

Those two men were the first explorers to go into the land of no men to find out things to help their people. They had found a good place for successful hunting with lots of fishes, animals, birds, trees and plants. Still, those men had something more to explore. Ahead of them, on their journey back to their people, were places they had not yet seen. Their plan to travel by boat was not easy. It was a new experience for them.

Ekeuhnick and Seelameu saw lots of new country at every bend of the river. They came to the big lake they had seen from the top of the mountain. It had looked small for the place where they sat high on the mountain. But, when they came to the end where the river joined the lake, they saw it was very large and long. The lake ran from east to west according to the sun. All around the lake the land was wide and flat. There were a few low hills on the north side of the lake, and a big mountain on the south. When they came out on the lake they found more things than ever. There were many big and small lakes around the largest lake. They saw many kinds of fish, game and seals. There were birch, water willow, and cottonwood trees on the land around the lake. There were no fir trees, but lots of wild berries.

Ekeuhnick and Seelameu looked around. Here was a place to their satisfaction. Around this big lake there was plenty to take care of their people. No man would go hungry here. Finally, both men agreed, this country around the lake was a good land for their people to occupy.

There were five rivers large enough to carry a boat in that place. There were lots of fishes in the rivers. Many streams flowed from the big mountain on the south side. Every river and creek flowed into the biggest lake. Many different kinds of birds, big and small animals, and the caribou were in the land. They lived in the rivers and in the mountains as well as along the shores of the lakes and ponds.

“This is it,” Ekeuhnick and Seelameu agreed, “a plenty for every Eskimo.”

In a few days the men were again on their way back to their people. After they passed through the one big lake in the basin, they found another lake. They had to go west to follow the water. After a long journey they came to a third lake. It was a very big one. They knew they would come to the ocean soon.

The men traveled in their umiak only when it was calm. They were learning how to travel with a boat. They learned how to make a good sail. They sailed when the water was calm and there was the right kind of wind. When the wind was calm they paddled or walked on the shore and pulled the boat with a rawhide rope. Finally, they went down the last river and came to the shore of the sea.

The men looked at the sea and along the beach. One man found a dead walrus. It was the first time in their lives they had even seen a big sea animal. They began to find out what was in it, and how the animal could be used. They cut it open with a stone knife. It had a tough heavy hide and it was hard work. They cut the hide off from the meat. There was lots of oil on the meat. The men tasted it. It sure was good. One man got some dry caribou meat and put some oil on it, then he ate it. He said it sure was good. Seelameu and Ekeuhnick decided the oil was so good, they would take some with them on their journey. They put it in a skin bag.

The men saw that the walrus hide was so thick and strong and big it could be used for a boat cover. It would be better than the caribou skins sewed together. Many people learned from Ekeuhnick and Seelameu to use walrus hide for a skin boat. Walrus hide has been good to use for a boat ever since their time. People know now that walrus has a useful skin for boats and it lasts a longer time than caribou hide.

Ekeuhnick and Seelameu figured all this out, and decided to make a big umiak. They found long beach woods (driftwood) would make a better frame than willow and cottonwood. As they camped on the shore that night they were still figuring and planning how to build a new boat. They talked about how much better it could be. They discussed how the people could move using the bigger boats. They knew the time was getting short for such a long journey for so many people. The season was changing. It would turn into winter time soon.

“So,” Ekeuhnick said, “We will bring our people here and stay to build boats in the summer season. Then our people can move to the good country we have found.”

The men started off again on their journey to where their people lived. Finally, they came to a river they saw they must follow to get to their people. Those Eskimos of ancient times were sure surprised when they saw Ekeuhnick and Seelameu come back to the place they were staying.

IX

The Return

Ekeuhnick and Seelameu had many things with them to show their people. They were things to help the people live a better and easier life. These men had learned ways of doing things that made living possible in the changed times. Ekeuhnick and Seelameu became teachers. Soon the people were learning to make the things like Seelameu and Ekeuhnick had done, and they learned how to use them just fine.

Before night time, on the day they came back, Ekeuhnick called the people together to tell them about their journey and to tell them about what they found and what they learned. They showed the people how to make tools to build the snares and traps and the other things to catch the animals, birds, and fishes. They told about the rich country where no men lived. They explained how this land could be a new home with plenty for everyone. They told about the better living they had found in that far off country and how they could travel there by using boats. They told stories about more food for the winter time and described what they had seen.

Then Ekeuhnick said, “We must make preparations if you people want to move. You will have to build boats like the one we came in. You can see what kind of boat we built and how to use it with your own eyes. You people must begin to do as we tell you, and do it the way we want you to do it. When we tell you people to do something, you must do it. That is the only way we will get to the place where there is better living in a short time.

“First we must move to where lots of beach wood has drifted up so we can build big boats. We will use those big boats to go to the rich and useful land. Once you people arrive at the place we found you will not be sorry. You will be happy.”

Soon every man agreed to go. Everyone began getting ready. Ekeuhnick and Seelameu led the way to where they had found lots of driftwood along the beach. The men made a large house for everyone to live in through the coming winter time. Soon the stormy weather came and it was winter time again.

The people lived off the land along the ocean shore and did the things Ekeuhnick and Seelameu told them to so they could get ready for the long journey when the spring time came and the boats could go up the rivers.

X

The People Move

It was still cold and the ocean was frozen far out to sea. The people were getting hungry. One evening the men talked about finding a way to catch seals from under the shore ice. They had not hunted the seals before.

A few days later one of the men caught a seal out on the ice. He caught it with a spear. The spear had a skin rope on it to haul the seal out of the water. Later, every man made a spear like that one to catch seals because it worked so good.

Some of the men brought in seals every day. Whoever hunted caribou brought in caribou every day, too. The hunting was good.

When the spring season came the people gathered the long pieces of beach wood to be ready for building the boats. In March the men began to cut long driftwood into the right sizes for the boat frame. The people named this time Sainotoavick just as Aungayoukuksuk had foretold.

Soon the people had everything they needed to begin building the boats. They had made all kinds of light rawhide ropes. They even made a light rope to bind the wood together. They had no kind of nails to use then, only rawhide to bind things together.

Everyone worked very hard. Before long, most of the families had their own boats. Everyone helped each other. They had to build the boats before the ice was gone. Every boat was finished before that time.

One day, after the ice left, it was real calm weather. Very early in the morning there was not a breath of wind. The people started off with Ekeuhnick and Seelameu leading all of the boats. The boats were being pulled along the shore by three or four men to each boat. Late in the evening they camped and rested. It took them eight days to get to the big lake that Ekeuhnick and Seelameu promised them they would see. This lake was the start of their journey into the better land near the great mountain. Here the Eskimo people would find a better life for many generations to come.

The people of Ekeuhnick and Seelameu were not sorry they had moved. New generations came and the people settled in many places on the lands around the big mountain. They remembered the First Disaster and told their children the stories of Ekeuhnick and Seelameu. They were happy and lived in a plentiful land until the time of the Second Disaster.

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