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history cannot be learned of the Innuits in [[underlined]] two hours [[/underlined]] (Vide McClintock's Narrative "May 7th 1859" when he says he had the good fortune to arrive to an inhabited snow-village on King Williams Land of 10 or 12 huts & 30 or 40 natives & "did not prolong my stay with them beyond a couple of hours" nor two months.
In truth, I could live among them the Innuits of K.W.L. & B. for two or three years & gain something new from time to time during this number of years.
Under date May 7th in said Narrative McClintock tells us after having a brief interview with some of said natives the following
"We could not arrive to any approximation to the number of Whites nor of the years elapsed since they" (of the officers & men of Erebus & Terror) "were lost".  "This" (continues the record) "was all the information we could obtain, & it was with great difficulty so much could be gleaned, [[underlined]] the dialect being strange to Petersen" [[/underlined]] (the Danish Interpreter) & the natives far more inclined to ask questions than to answer them".

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From my experience in getting information from the Innuits I have this remark to make that Whatever intelligence McClintock has recorded as gained from the Innuits with whom conversed through the medium of his Interpreter, Petersen, must be received with [[underlined]] extreme [[/underlined]] caution.  Some of it may be correct & some of it may be [[underlined]] directly the reverse [[/underlined]] of what was [[underlined]] intended [[/underlined]] to be conveyed by the communicating Innuits.  It is only by [[underlined]] short [[/underlined]] & [[underlined]] repeated interviews [[/underlined]] with this people that [[underlined]] facts [[/underlined]] can be learned of them.  It is necessary to question

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many individuals of this peculiar people separately of any generally known matter of history among them before making deductions from their answers.
In the first place it is [[underlined]] all important [[/underlined]] the he or she who is to act the Interpreter (if not of the immediate neighborhood) should become well acquainted with the dialect [[underlined]] peculiar [[/underlined]] to the people of whom information is to be derived.
It is with the greatest difficulty that the Innuits who come here from Seko-Selah, or any other place on the Northern shores of Hudson's Straits, can make themselves understood by Innuits belonging to the coasts of Tu-nuk-jok-ping-oo-sy-ong (Frobisher Bay) of Knew-yum-mi-uke (Rescue Bay) or Oo-Kood-lear (Budington Bay) & of Tu-nuk-jok-ping

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(Northumberland Inlet) - & [[underlined]] Vice-Versa [[/underlined]] - it is with equal trouble that the above Innuits (of the places named) can make themselves understood by Hudson Straits Innuits.  Sometimes Innuits arrive from Ig-loo-lik at Tu-nuk-jok-ping (Northumberland Inlet).  It takes time before the one can understand the other.
The most difficult of all would be for a Greenlander Innuit to make himself understood by any of the Innuits between West side of Davis Strait & Behing Strait, leaving out the Labrador natives.  I believe the Dane Petersen entirely incompetent to fill the place of an Interpreter on the important mission of McClintock's to King Williams