NORTH AMERICAN BOW.S, ARROWS, AND QUIVERS. 663 



head upon an arrow. The feathers were split carefully and any exces. 

 sive pith or horny portion of the quill removed. The pieces to form 

 the feathering were trimmed to the same length. The Indian next 

 shredded some sinew, wliich had been sent to the Museum from Huj)a 

 Reservation in California, prepared by the relatives of the Apaches 

 that had been separated from them for centuries. This he chewed 

 until it was soft and pliant. He was now ready to lay on his feathers. 

 They were placed on the shaftment, wrapped slightly at the ends with 

 sinew to hold them in position until they could be adjusted to suit his 

 rigorous taste, at equal distances apart and at the proper distance 

 from the nock. Placing the shaft under his left arm and holding the 

 soft sinew in his right arm, he revolved the arrow with the thumb and 

 fingers of his left hand and guided tlie wrapping with his right hand. 

 Here was a ])rimitiv^e machine, with shaft and two bearings, used for 

 the purpose of winding evenly a thread upon a spool. The wrapping 

 or "seizing" of an Indian arrow is a very pretty and uniform piece of 

 work. Mr. Hough calls attention to the operation of this Apache fletcher 

 and gives drawing.* Among the northwestern Eskimos it is common 

 to neglect the seizing of sinew and to insert the ends of the quill portion 

 of the feather into the soft wood by means of a pointed ivory implement. 

 As mentioned, ^•ery many Eskimo arrows are found without feathers 

 at all, the very heavy foreshaft or iron head carrying the arrow forward 

 with sufficient accuracy. On the other hand, many of the barbed har- 

 poons and bird tridents of the Eskimo are provided with feathers. In 

 the feathering of an arrow one feather must be uppermost, called in 

 archery the cock feather. In some beautiful specimens from Cooks 

 Inlet and near by one feather is snow wliite. But the author has 

 examined many hundreds of arrows without being able to detect that 

 the arrow-maker had in mind to draw attention to any one of the 

 feathers so as to create a true bottom and top to his missile. In the 

 Eskimo two-feathered arrow tlu^re is, of course, always one feather on 

 top and another under. 



The number of feathers on a Xorth American arrow is an exceed- 

 ingly variable quantity. As a general rule the Eskimo have two and 

 the Indians three. This will do i^retty well as a rule, but many three- 

 feathered and no-feathered arrows occnir in Eskimo land, and among 

 Indain tribes no-feather arrows are common. The function of the 

 feather is to retard the rear end of the missile and cause the arrow to 

 go straight. This object being capable of accomplishment in other 

 ways the feather may be omitted. 



The feathering of an arrow nuist be studied: 



(1) The species of bird from which the feather is taken. 



(2) The "number of feathers, two, three, nuiny. 



(3) The shape and trimming of the feathers. 



* American Anthropologist, iv, 61. 



