Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 40, Number 6, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 27 September 1907 — Eskimos Are Superstitious. [ARTICLE]

Eskimos Are Superstitious.

The Eskimos at Ramah and at the stations south are all supi>osedi to be Christians, hut naturally they still retain mauy of the traditional beliefs and superstitions of their ancestors, says Dillon Wallace in Outing. They will not live in a house where a death has occurred, •believing that the spirit of the departed will hauut the place. If the building is worth it they take it down and set it up again somewhere else. Not long ago the wife of one of the Eskimos was taken seriously ill and became delirious. Her husband aiwl his neighbors, deciding that she was ]>ossessed of an evil spirit, tied her down and lift her until finally she died, unaired for and alone, Troth cold and lack of nourishment. This occurred at a distance from the stations and the missionaries did not learn of it uutil the woman was dead and beyond their aid. Once Dr. Grenfell visited Ramah and exhibited to The astonished Eskimos some storeoptlcon viewa—photographs that he had taken there in a previous year. It so happened that one of the pictures was that of an old woman who had died since the photograph was made, and when It appeared upon the screen terror struck the hearts of the slmple-tnitided people. They believed it was her spirit returned to earth ainl for a long time afterward Imagined that they saw it floating about at uighf. visiting the woman's old haunts.