Lord Arthur Savile's Crime
LORD ARTHUR SAVILE'S CRIME AND OTHER STORIES Contents Lord Arthur Savile's Crime The Canterville Ghost The Sphinx Without a Secret The Model Millionaire The Portrait of Mr. W. H. LORD ARTHUR SAVILE'S CRIME
The practice of preserving the bodies of those belonging to
the whaling class--a custom peculiar to the Kadiak
Innuit--has erroneously been confounded with the one now
described. The latter included women as well as men, and all
those whom the living desired particularly to honor. The
whalers, however, only preserved the bodies of males, and
they were not associated with the paraphernalia of those I
have described. Indeed, the observations I have been able to
make show the bodies of the whalers to have been preserved
with stone weapons and actual utensils instead of effigies,
and with the meanest apparel, and no carvings of
consequence. These details, and those of many other customs
and usages of which the shell heaps bear no testimony * * *
do not come within my line.
Figure 5, copied from Dall, represents the Alaskan mummies.
Martin Sauer, secretary to Billings' Expedition,[36] speaks of the
Aleutian Islanders embalming their dead, as follows:
They pay respect, however, to the memory of the dead, for
they embalm the bodies of the men with dried moss and grass;
bury them in their best attire, in a sitting posture, in a
strong box, with their darts and instruments; and decorate
the tomb with various coloured mats, embroidery, and
paintings. With women, indeed, they use less ceremony. A
LORD ARTHUR SAVILE'S CRIME AND OTHER STORIES Contents Lord Arthur Savile's Crime The Canterville Ghost The Sphinx Without a Secret The Model Millionaire The Portrait of Mr. W. H. LORD ARTHUR SAVILE'S CRIME