222 EEPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1!X)2. 



through the lips. The material is kept in a plaquc-likc work hasket 

 called tarlth (".spread out," from its flat bottom and low, flaring 

 sides). Besides the shell or metal knife there is generally a rude awl, 

 consisting- of a spike of goat or deer horn, a bear's claw, or a piece of 

 bone rubbed down to a tapering point, and a large incisor of the brown 

 bear or the tooth of the killer whale. These constitute all of the tools 

 and accessories used in basketry. (Emmons.) 



Plate 12 represents a Porno Indian basketmaker. In front of her 

 is an unfinished water-tight l)asket jai- in plain twined weaving. The 

 warp elements are willow rods dressed down to uniform thickness; 

 the weft is of carex root and cercis stems split, the patterns being 

 made in the latter. Photographed by H. W. Henshaw. 



Plate 13 represents a Tlinkit woman of Sitka, Alaska, making a 

 twined basket. All the native surroundings are absent — the environ- 

 ment, as men are wont to say — but the artist's mind and skillful 

 fingers remain. She has four elements to handle simultaneousl}^ — 

 warp, two wefts, and decorative material. The mouth, therefore, is 

 brought into requisition, as may be seen. The operation consists in 

 twining with finely diAdded spruce root and wrapping each outside 

 splint with colored straw. The work resembles embroidery IVhen 

 finished and is, -in this work, called false eml)roidery. 



There seems to be always an affectionate fellow feeling between the 

 skillful hand of the artisan and the materials which it fashions. The 

 more tractable the latter, the more deft the former. That is not 

 always true in culture. The best endowment does not alwa3^s Afield 

 the best results. But the statement holds good in our art with few 

 exceptions. Where the finest grasses grow, and the toughest roots 

 and stems, they set up a school of mutual refinement between the 

 woman and her work. It needs only a few miles eastward or north- 

 ward to change the garden into a desert and correspondingly to degen- 

 erate the artist. It would be unjust to her ingenious mind to over- 

 look the fact that she has not been utterly cast down by the failure of 

 one kind of material. She is not long in finding out new substances 

 and new technic processes for each environment. 



WOVEN BASKETRY 



The various processes of manufacture will now be definitely 

 explained. In technic, as already said (p. IIH)), basketr}" is either hand- 

 woven or sewed. The hand-woven basketiy is further divisible into 

 (A) Chech' nrofl^ (B) TvuUedirorl'^ (C) Wlch'nr<>)'l\ (D) W7'aj)pedioorl- , 

 and (E) Tvrhiedirorl'., in several varieties. The sewed work goes by 

 the name of coiled l)asketrv, and is classed both by the foundation and 

 the fastening. In addition to these technical methods on the body, 

 special ones are to be found in the ])order. 



