The operation of "flinching" this
animal, which was thirty-nine feet and a half in length, occupied most
of the afternoon, each ship taking half the blubber and hauling it on
the ice, "to make off" or put into casks.
As soon as we had completed the stowage of the blubber, and washed the
ships and people's clothes, we cast off on the 6th, taking in tow the
carcass of the whale (technically called the "crang") for our friends at
Igloolik. The wind dying away when the ships were off the northeast end
of the island, the boats were despatched to tow the whale on shore,
while Captain Lyon and myself went ahead to meet some of the canoes that
were paddling towards us. We soon joined eleven of them, and on our
informing the Esquimaux of the prize the boats were bringing them, they
paddled off with great delight. When they arrived at the spot, and had
civilly asked permission to eat some of it, they dropped their canoes
astern to the whale's tail, from which they cut off enormous lumps of
flesh and ravenously devoured it; after which they followed our boats
in-shore, where the carcass was made fast to a mass of grounded ice for
their future disposal.
As we made several tacks off the island next to the northward of
Igloolik, called by the Esquimaux _Neerlo-Nackto_, two canoes came off
to us, in one of which was Toolemak.
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