At various locations across the Arctic the Inuit hunted the small, white whale called the beluga. These animals gathered at the mouths of large rivers in the summer to feed and give birth to their young. The Inuit, by splashing the water and making a great uproar, forced the frightened whales into the shallows where they were easily speared. This man is standing beside a beluga killed at the Little Whale River on the eastern shore of Hudson Bay. The buoy in the foreground is an inflated seal bladder. In the background is a kayak, the fragile, speedy craft the Inuit used to chase the whales. The kayak was constructed of a wooden frame covered in sealskin. The photograph was taken by George Simpson McTavish, an employee of the Hudson's Bay Company, in 1865.
Courtesy: National Photography Collection, Public Archives of Canada (C-8160)
