782 EEPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1895. 



The operation is very expeditiously mauaged by passing a needle and thread, the 

 latter covered with lamp black and oil, nuder the epidermis, according to a pattern 

 previously marked out upon the skin. Several sketches being thus taken at once, 

 the thumb is pressed ujiou the part, while the thread is drawn through, by which 

 means the coloring matter is retained and a permanent dye of a blue tinge imparted 

 to the skin. 



Ill the absence of needles, says the author, a strip of whalebone is 

 used as a substitute. It is furthermore stated that the patterns " are 

 nearly the same in all," and that " a little of this kind of mark is on the 

 back part of their hands; and with them we understood it to be con- 

 sidered as a souvenir of some distant or deceased person who had 

 performed it." 



Marks of distinction by tattooing are employed by the men to denote 

 success in whaling. " Those men who are or bave been captains of 

 whaling umiaks that have taken whales have marks tattooed some- 

 where on their person, sometimes forming a definite tally." ^ 



Mr. Murdoch refers to an exani])le in the person of a native named 

 Afioru, who had a broad band tattooed across each cheek, extending 

 from the corner of the mouth backward toward the lobe of the ear. 

 These bands were made up of many indistinct lines, which were said 

 to indicate "many whales." Another instance was that of a native 

 who "had the ' flukes' of seven whales in a line across the chest." 



The wife of the former " had a little mark tattooed on each corner of 

 her mouth, which she said were ' whale marks,' indicating that she was 

 the wife of a successful whaleman." ' 



McGlure notes that at Cape Bathurst he observed that a successful 

 harpooner had a blue line drawn across the bridge of the nose,^ and, 

 according to Armstrong, he has a line tattooed from the inner angle 

 of the ej^e across the cheek, a new one being added for every wliale 

 he strikes.^ Father Petitot remarks that in this region whales are 

 "scored" by "tattooing crosses on the shoulder, and that a murderer 

 is marked across the nose with a couple of horizontal lines." ^ It is 

 interesting, says Murdoch, that one of the "striped" men at Nuwuk 

 told us he had killed a man. In east Greenland tattooing is similarly 

 performed. Holm, remarking, in reference to the residents at Angina- 

 gralik, that "Ma^ndene ere kun undtagelsvis tatoverede og da kun 

 nied enkelte mindre Streger paa Arme og Haandled. for at Kunne 

 harpunere godt." - 



INSTRUMENTS AND COLORS. 



A'arious instruments are employed by the Eskimo in preparing for 

 the reception of pictographs the several substances used for that 

 jiurpose. The pigments are now chiefly obtained from the trader, 



' Ninth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology, 1887-«8, 1892, p. 139. 

 - Discovery of Northwest Passage, p. 93. 

 ^Personal Narrative, p. 176. 

 'Monograpliie, etc., p. xxv. 

 5 Geogr. Tidskrift VIII, p. 88. 



