BEECHEY'S EXPEDITION. 153 



with thongs of hide, or pieces of whalebone placed at 

 the back, and neatly bound with small cord. The 

 points of their arrows were of bone, flint, or iron, and 

 their spears headed with the same materials. Their 

 dress was similar to that of the other tribes on the 

 coast. It consisted of a shirt, which reached half-way 

 down the thigh, with long sleeves, and a hood of rein- 

 deer-skin, and edged with gray or white fox fur. Be- 

 sides this they had a jacket of eider-drake skins sewed 

 together, which, when engaged in war, they wore below 

 their other dress, reckoning it a tolerably efficient pro- 

 tection against an arrow or a spear-thrust. In wet 

 weather they threw over the fur dress a shirt made of 

 the entrails of the whale, which, being well saturated 

 with oil and grease, was water-tight ; and they also used 

 breeches of deer's hide, and seal-skin boots, to the 

 upper end of which were fixed strings of sea-horse 

 hide. It was their fashion to tie one of these strings 

 round the waist, and attach to it a long tuft of hair, the 

 wing of a bird, or, sometimes, a fox's tail, which, dan- 

 gling behind as they walked, gave them a ridiculous 

 appearance, and may probably have occasioned the 

 report of the Tschuktschi recorded in Muller, that the 

 people of this country have tails like dogs. 



On the 22d of July the ship anchored in Kotzebue's 

 Sound, and, after exploring a deep inlet on its northern 

 shore, which they named Hotham Inlet, proceeded to 

 Chamisso Island, where the Blossom was to await 

 Franklin. A discretionary power had, however, been 

 permitted to Beechey, of employing the period of his 

 stay in surveying the coast, provided this could be done 

 without the risk of missing Franklin. Having, accord 

 ingly, directed the barge to keep in-shore on the look- 

 out for the land party, he sailed to the northward, and, 

 doubling Cape Krusenstern, completed an examination 



