Dr King on the Industrial Arts of the Esquimaux, 127 



thick, and are fastened on with pegs of the same. This shoe- 

 ing is durable, and makes them slide very glibly. The wood 

 work is sewed together with split whalebone. A couple of 

 holes are bored through the fore ends of each plank, in which 

 are inserted the two ends of a strong short thong, made out 

 of the hide of a sea cow, and secured by a knot, and to the 

 middle part of the thong a separate one is fastened from each 

 dog." 



In 1631 , wood must have been more plentiful than in Cap- 

 tain Cartwright's time ; for Captain Luke Fox not only repre- 

 sents the side boards of the sledges to have been 4 inches 

 thick, but informs us that, by robbing the graves, which were 

 roofed with the sledges of the departed, after Indian custom, 

 he obtained a boat-load of firewood in a single sacrilegious 

 act. At the River Clyde, the sledges are made altogether 

 of bone, the right and left jaw-bones of a young whale form- 

 ing its sides, and the ribs of the animal the cross pieces, and 

 for the back are placed rein-deer horns in an upright posi- 

 tion.* Bone sledges are also in use at Schismarefflnletf and 

 Regent Bay.f At Regent Inlet the sledge is formed of a 

 " number of salmon, packed together in the form of a cylin- 

 der about 7 feet long, and wrapped up in the skins taken 

 from the canoes, which now cease to be of use ; when well 

 corded with thongs, two of these cylinders are pressed into 

 the shape of the runners, and having been left to freeze, 

 are secured by cross bars made of the legs of the deer or 

 musk-ox, so as to form the bottom of the sledge ; the bot- 

 tom of the runner is then covered with a mixture of moss, 

 earth, and water, which soon freezes to the depth of 2 inches, 

 after which comes the final process of plaiting the surface. 

 The operator takes some water in his mouth, and when some- 

 what mixed with saliva, it is deposited on a bear skin, which 

 is then gradually rubbed over the runner as by a brush, till 

 a coating of half an inch thick is produced, which has a more 

 than usual degree of tenacity, and is more slippery than the 

 ordinary material. These carriages travel much more lightly 

 than those shod with iron ; but as they cease to be of use as 



* Parry. f Kotxebue. t Ro«k 



