Foreign Iiiif)lcincnts. 109 



They were right in their contention, though they had perhaps forgotten that their 

 grandfathers admitted that the king owned the heavens and the earth, the sk^- and the 

 sea and all therein contained. 



Specimen No. 176 was purchased by an antiquarian colle6lor, of good repute, 

 as a Hawaiian shuttle, and with it came the following interesting history : 



"Made of tbe shiubone of Kuliakalanaia, au expert fisherman of Koliala, Hawaii. He was 

 also a man without liair on his linilis. For these reasons his bones were wanted for fish hooks, etc., 

 and he was therefore murdered for his bones. Lualauoho, an aipuupnu of Kaniakahelei, secured 

 the inner bone of the right leg as his share of tlie spoil. From it lie made this ka [hia], tatting 

 shuttle, which he very greatlj- prized on account of the good luck it brought his nets. On liis death 

 it passed to his son Kama who was also an aipuupnu of ttie same chief. Kama died at Hoopuloa, 

 April ID, 1886, over a hundred years old, the wealthiest native in Kona, when this ka was left to his 

 grandson G. L,. Walia Kealiikuli, who resold it February 12, 1887." 



That such a value was set on implements of human bone was entirely correct, 

 and there is little doubt in the writer's mind that the last native possessor believed the 

 history sttbmitted ; but on finding the material to be ivory and referring a sketch of it 

 to Professor O. T. Mason, that gentleman pronounced it an "Eskimo netting needle." 

 A comparison with shuttles figured in Nelson's work on "The Eskimo About Bering 

 Strait"^' will confirm this. From about 1837 until a few decades ago the Hawaiian Islands 

 were the wintering quarters for the whaling fleet operating off the coast of Alaska and in 

 the Bering Sea, and with it many native seamen shipped for the summer cruise. 



The other specimens, Nos. 5177 and 5178 were acqtiired in part of the collec- 

 tion of the late Queen Emma labelled "Ivor}' tools for netting koko and ieie baskets." 

 They were shown to several of the older natives, and while some did not recognize 

 them, others claimed them to be Hawaiian implements but were not familiar with their 

 ttses. Each specimen consists of two pieces : the larger is a slightly curved implement 

 with the outer arc notched at the butt end, smooth, rounded and decreasing in thickness 

 until the sharp point is reached : on the inner side, from the point to the first barb, is 

 a knife edge ; from the first to the second barb, and from the second for about one- 

 quarter the length it is curved, smooth and rounded, the remainder being straight and 

 plane. About one-quarter the length from the butt end is a re(5langular hole. This was 

 identified hy Profes.sor Mason from a sketch as the side prong of a Httd-son Baj^ spear point; 

 and, since Nelson reports a similar one from St. Lawrence Island," these specimens no 

 doubt reached Bering vStrait through trade and by the same means the native sailors 

 acquired them and brought them here. The smaller implements are somewhat similar to 

 the marlinspikes used in netting and figured in the same paper from Cape Nome,'^ and 

 each implement is provided with the spur-like proje(5lion mentioned therein. 



"Eighteenth Annual Report of the Bureau of .American Ethnologjf, pi. Ixxiii. 

 "Pages 149 and 150, fig. 42 (8), of the same work. 

 "Page 193, pi. Ixxii, figs. 19 and 20 of the same work. 



