At Shingle Point, on the Arctic Coast, near the Richardson Mountains, I spent several days with a man who was trading with the Eskimo who were hunting the Richardson Mountains. There were several Eskimo in his camp at the time, and he had in his possession skins of the white sheep, caribou, and a variety of fur-bearing animals, but there was no sign of musk-ox, and I learned on careful inquiry through my interpreter that the natives seemed to know nothing of them, with the exception of one young man who had been to the eastward on one of the whaling ships. The Tooyogmioots, a tribe of Eskimo who once lived along this coast and hunted these different mountains, are now almost extinct. I found between the mouth of the Mackenzie and Herschel Island a very few individuals living in snow houses, but I did not find in or around their places of residence any sign of musk-ox skins, bones, or heads.
I remained at Herschel Island from Nov. 24 to Dec. 14, visiting the Rev. I. O. Stringer and Capt. Haggerty of the steam-whaler, _Mary Dehume_. Both men were able to converse readily with the Eskimo in the Eskimo tongue, and they gave me every possible assistance in making my inquiries. This whole coast far to the westward of Herschel Island is now occupied by the Noonitagmiott tribe of Eskimo. There were a large number of these people at the island, and among them were parties who hunted all the mountains of the mainland mentioned, living in the mountains a great part of the time. Many skins of caribou, sheep, and fur-bearing animals were seen in the possession of these people, but none of them possessed any part of the musk-ox, and the only members of the tribe who knew anything of the musk-ox were those who had been carried to the east by whaling ships. The Rev. Mr. Stringer takes great interest in the natural resources of the country and travels extensively among these people, but he had no knowledge of the existence of any musk-oxen west of the Mackenzie. Capt. Haggerty had wintered along this coast for a number of years, trading extensively with the natives, but he had never secured or heard of a musk-ox skin west of the Mackenzie.
All the whaling ships, which have wintered here for years, sometimes as many as fifteen at the same time, keep Eskimo hunters in the field continually for the purpose of securing fresh meat for the crews, sending white sailors in charge of dog sleds to visit the Eskimo camps to bring in the meat. It is not uncommon for these sleds to go one hundred and fifty to two hundred miles for meat, and all the mountains to the north and west of Herschel Island have been visited many times by these hunters and sledding parties, without obtaining any trace of musk-ox. Collinson, who wintered near Camden Bay in 1853-54, does not mention the musk-ox. The U. S. Government Survey party, which wintered on the Porcupine several years ago and visited Rampart House, a Hudson Bay trading post at the Ramparts on the Porcupine River, and who went from there with Mr. John Firth, the Hudson Bay Company’s trader, north through these mountains to the Arctic Coast and returned, did not find musk-ox. Several white men have travelled back and forth through these mountains from Fort Yukon, on the Yukon River, to Herschel Island, for the purpose of securing sled dogs of the Eskimo on the Arctic Coast, to be used on the Yukon, without securing or learning anything of the musk-ox. Mr. Hodgson and Mr. Firth, both in the service of the Hudson Bay Company, have been stationed at Fort Yukon at the mouth of the Porcupine, at Rampart House on the Porcupine, and at Lapierres House on Bell River, a tributary of the Porcupine, during a period of over thirty years, trading with the Loucheaux Indians, several tribes of which hunt north of these places into the mountains mentioned, without ever obtaining any knowledge of the existence of musk-ox; and the Hudson Bay Company have never secured at any of these posts any skins of the musk-ox.