Under The Northern Lights by Alan Sullivan

Peeguk, the Flat-footed One, lived, when he was at home, not a thousand miles from Fort Herschell, and, for the Arctic, this is a fairly close address, from which he would be easily found by one who knew the country. Fort Herschell is, as all the world knows, a mass of rock as big as two or three English counties, and situated not a great way from the mouth of the Coppermine River. It is wind-whipped, storm-smitten and ice-blistered, and, in the short-lived summer, occasionally quite warm. The fort--though there is no fort--is the farthest north spot where abide the representatives of law and order.

Peeguk's very mobile headquarters were on the mainland. Sometimes he found it rather lonely, and this in spite of the fact that his joys and sorrows were shared by Oomgah, the Moon-faced One. There was never any shortage of food. White whales, for instance, came ashore every now and then in summer, and as soon as Peeguk saw that they were firmly wedged among the rocks he would move his topeck--or, rather, Oomgah moved it--to the nearest point, and the whale furnished a free lunch counter from which, perhaps for weeks, they carved lean and fat as their leisurely fancy desired. By night the white bears slouched up to help themselves, and after them the lesser fry of the curved-clawed, short-furred, sharp-toothed family; so under this combined assault the whale, which only weighed from twelve to fifteen tons, did not last very long. But it was all quite amicable, with the rules of precedence mutually remembered and recognised. It happened on a day that some coast Huskies came along in the fine weather, floating like gulls on the placid sea, and camped at the mouth of Wind River, not far from the summer residence of Peeguk. Amongst them was a certain Atokwok, the Far-sighted One, known to many of the small brown tribes as being wise and of great experience. Especially was he learned when it was a matter of the doings and habits of white men. And it occurred when Peeguk and he were sharing a still living salmon that the latter had just jerked up through six fathom of cold green water, that Peeguk, whose throat was full of fish, asked if there was anything new in that particular part of the world.