NORTH AMERICAN BOWS, ARROWS, AND QUIVERS, 671 



a mallet of very hard wood, strikes the chisel (or punch) on the upi)er 

 end, tlakiug- the Hint ofifou the under side, below each projecting point 

 that is struck. The I3int is then turned and chijiped in the same 

 manner from the opposite side, and so turned and chipped until the 

 required shape and dimensions are obtained, all the fractures being- 

 made on the palm of the hand. 



"In selecting a Hake for the arrow-head a nice judgment nuist be 

 used or the attempt will fail; a Hake with two opposite parallel or 

 nearly parallel i)lanes is found, and of the thickness required for the 

 center of the arrow-point. The first chipping reaches near to the center 

 of these planes, but without quite breaking it away, and each chipping 

 is shorter and shorter, until the shape and the edge of the arrow-head 

 are formed. 



"The yielding elasticity of the palm of the hand enables the chip to 

 come off without breaking the body of the flint, which would be the 

 case if they were broken on a hard substance. These people have no 

 metallic instruments to work with, and the instrument (pnnch) which 

 they use I was told was a piece of bone; but on examining it I found it 

 to be a substance much harder, made of the tooth (incisoi) of the sperm 

 whale, or sea lion, which are often stranded on the coast of the Pacific. 

 This punch is about (5 or 7 inches in length and 1 inch in diameter, with 

 one rounded side and two i)]ane sides; therefore ])resenting one acute 

 and two obtuse angles to suit the ])oints to be broken. 



"This operation is very curions, both the holder and the striker sing- 

 ing, and the strokes of the mallet given exactly in time with the music, 

 and with a sharp and rebounding blow, in which, the Indians tell us, is 

 the great medicine (or mystery of the operation). 



"The bows also of this tribe, as well as the arrow-heads, are made 

 with great skill, either of wood and covered on the back witli sinew, or 

 of bone, said to be brcmght from the sea-coast, and probably from the 

 sperm whale. These weapons, nuicli like those of the Sioux and 

 Comanches, for use on horseback, are short, for convenience of hand- 

 ling, and of great i)ower, generally of 2A feet in length, and their mode 

 of using them in war and the chase is not surpassed by any Indians on 

 the continent."* 



"The bows of the Beothucs are all of sycamore, which being very 

 scarce in their country, and the only wood it produces that is fit for 

 this use, becomes very valuable. Mr. Peyton informed Lloyd that their 

 bows were roughly made of mountain ash or dogwood ; they were formed 

 by splitting the piece of wood selected for the purpose down the middle, 

 the round side of which formed the back of tlie bow. The sticks are 

 not chosen with any nicety, some of them being knotty and very riule 

 in appearance, but they show a considerable amount of c(tnstructive 

 skill. Except in the grasp the inside of them is cut flat, but so obli 

 quely and with so nmch skill that the string will vibrate in a direc- 

 tion coinciding directly with the thicker edge of the bow. The bow 

 is fully 5^ feet long. The string was made of deer's sinew. 



"Beothuc arrows were made of jtine (white) or sycanioie, and were 

 slender, light, and straight. The head was a two edged lance about (J 

 inches long, made of iron taken from the traps, and other objects of 

 that metal, which they had stolen from the furriers and fishermen. 



"Cartwright says, in his journal of a residence in Labrador, that the 

 head of the arrow was a barbed lance G inches long made out of an old 



* George Catlin, Last EaviUes, pp. 187 to 190, in Smithsonian Report, 1885, p. 743. 



