fact, are in a state of relentless slavery; every species of drudgery
devolves upon them. When they remove from camp to camp in winter, the
women set out first, dragging sledges loaded with their effects, and
such of the children as are incapable of walking; meantime the men
remain in the abandoned encampment smoking their pipes, until they
suppose the women are sufficiently far advanced on the route to reach
the new encampment ere they overtake them.

Arrived at the spot, the women clear the ground of snow, erect the
tents, and collect fuel; and when their arrangements are completed,
their lords step in to enjoy themselves. The sole occupation of the
men is hunting, and, in winter, fishing. They do not even carry home
the game; that duty also falls to the lot of the female, unless when
the family has been starving for some time, when the men condescend to
carry home enough for immediate use.

The horrid practice still obtains among the Nascopies of destroying
their parents and relatives, when old age incapacitates them for
further exertion. I must, however, do them the justice to say, that
the parent himself expresses a wish to depart, otherwise the unnatural
deed would probably never be committed; for they in general treat
their old people with much care and tenderness. The son or nearest
relative performs the office of executioner,--the self-devoted victim
being disposed of by strangulation.[1] When any one dies in winter,
the body is placed on a scaffold till summer, when it is interred.

[Footnote 1: "Quidam parentes et propinquos, priusquam annis et macie
conficiantur, velut hostias cædunt, _eorumque visceribus epulantur_."
The Nascopies do not feast on the "viscera" of their victims, nor do
I believe the inhabitants of India, or of any other country under