A SUNDAY SERVICE IN GREENLAND by Prof. G. Frederick Wright

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Nov 5, 1894

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 20, No. 52.

A SUNDAY SERVICE IN GREENLAND.

By Prof. G. Frederick Wright

BY PROF. G. FREDERICK WRIGHT.

IN the month of August last I set out with a party of eight from Sukkertoppen, near the 65th parallel in Greenland, to spend a week in camping near the projection of the inland ice which there comes down in close proximity to the shore. A hard pull at the oars for twenty miles brought us, late Friday night, to Ikamiut, a little settlement of Eskimos, consisting of three igloos, sheltering about twenty-five inhabitants, young and old. Here we pitched our tent and made our headquarters. Besides our own party there were seven natives who accompanied us, two with kayaks, and five to aid in rowing. On our arrival we were greeted by the whole settlement, who shouted their welcome in language totally unintelligible to any but themselves and those of their race who were with us. Their actions, however, were easily interpreted. They all assisted us in landing our boats and in transferring our luggage to a position of safety, and in selecting for us a favorable place for pitching our tent. This having been done in the bright daylight, that at this season never forsook us, we retired, to rest as well as we could amid these novel circumstances.

On Saturday the weather was unpropitious. The wind blew hard, and the air was full of fog and drizzly rain. We were able to do little but sit in our tent and cultivate the acquaintance of our strange but kindly and well-disposed neighbors. They were curious to see everything we had, and to know both what it was and what it was for. We were equally curious to learn everything about them and their condition. In recognition of their good will they brought us an abundant supply of moss to carpet our tent and to disguise the hardness of our rocky floor.

Sunday morning came, and it was still cold and rainy. While we were eating our breakfast and shivering over our coal oil stove in the tent, a man of mild appearance and diminutive stature came to the door with a hymn book and a Bible in his hands, and pointed to them, to indicate, as we surmised, that there was to be religious service somewhere in the settlement. But he did not linger long, and suddenly disappeared, and we were at a loss to know where the service was to be held; for the settlement was squalid in the extreme. A flood in the spring had destroyed nearly every igloo, and their present abodes were but partial resurrections of what were originally miserable enough. But on going down to our boats we heard singing in one of the igloos. Stooping before the low door and pushing it open on our hands and knees, we were welcomed by motions into the most interesting church service I ever expect to attend. The room in itself was dreary beyond description. The low walls of stone and turf were reeking with moisture, while water distilled freely from the sod roof in various places, and squirted up from the crevices between the loose stones with which a part of the floor was covered, as one walked over them. The only dry place was the shelf, elevated about a foot on the east side of the room, and which was the sleeping place of the inmates at night and their lounging place by day. A cylindrical sheet-iron stove near the door was now cold and lifeless, because the moss was so wet that it was impossible to make it burn. A lamp of seal oil freshly distilled from the raw blubber was burning in the other end of the room, being the special property and care of the oldest woman of the household. In no place could one stand erect.

Yet here was gathered the whole community for worship. Of course I could not understand the words of their hymn, but the tune was a grand German choral, in which all united perfectly in the slow, dignified, and effective movement. Then followed a sermon from the little man, who proved to be the catechist. This was delivered in the native language, and with much unction, though from necessity the speaker remained in a sitting posture. The only words intelligible to me, in either the sermons or the prayers, were the "amens," in which all joined. Finally the service was closed with another hymn, sung to an equally impressive German choral.

Not to be excelled, . . . we arranged an English service in our tent after the midday meal, and circulated the notice among the Eskimos in the same manner as that employed by the catechist in the morning. We should have been glad to ask them into the tent, but as they have not yet learned that cleanliness is next to godliness, prudence suggested that they be excluded; so I stood in the door with our own company massed near the entrance, while the Eskimos, notwithstanding the inclement weather, gathered in front of the tabernacle. They were all there, listening with the utmost devotion to the singing and the service, of which they understood not a word.—N. Y. Independent.