GRAPHIC ART OF THE ESKIMOS. 927 



especially noticeable in Znni and Algoiikian i)i('tograpliy to represent 

 what is designated as tlie life line. This consists of a line drawn from 

 the mouth, or very near it, backward into the body, where it terminates 

 in a line, or more generally a triangular figure, to denote the head. It 

 is a shamanistic figure, and indicates that the shaman who possessed 

 it had infiuence over the life of the animal so portrayed. This subject 

 has been more clearly described in connection with the shamanistic 

 ceremonies of the Ojibwa Indians in the en- 

 graving of the Mide'wiwin or Grand IMedicine 

 Society of the Ojibwa, published in the Four- 

 teenth Annual Report of the Bureau of Eth- 

 nology. 



VOTIVE OFFERINGS AND MORTUARY. Fiji- U6. 



VOTIVE OFFERINf!. 



Fig. 14G is coj)ied from a piece of walrus 

 ivory in the museum of the Alaska Commercial Company, San Fran- 

 cisco, California, and was interpreted to the present writer in San 

 Francisco in 1882. 



The left-hand figure is a votive offering or "shaman stick," com- 

 monly designated a medicine stick, erected to the memory of one 

 departed. The "bird" carvings are considered typical of "good 

 spirits," and the above was erected by the remorse- 

 jl X/ stricken individual who had killed'the person shown. 



The headless body rej)resents the man who was killed. 



In this respect the Ojibwa manner of portraying a man 



"killed" or "dead" is similar. Comparison with another 



Eskimo drawing-, designating- a "killed whale" by the 



presence in the back of a harpoon, maybe made herewith 



as another conception of the idea of "dead" or "killed." 



^^ The right-hand figure represents the homicide who 



/!^" erected the "grave post" or "shaman stick." The arm 



^ is thrust downward toward the earth, to represent the 



J, gesture for ]:ill. This is common, likewise, to the gesture 



..^^P^ for the same idea as made by the Blackfeet and Dakota 



Indians. 



In fig. 147 is reproduced an inscription from a grave 

 X)0st commemorating- a hunter, as land animals are shown 

 Fig. 147. to be his cliief i)ursuit. The following- is the explanatiou 

 INSCRIPTION ON of thc cliaracters : 



r.RA^EPosT. jSTo. rt is the baidarka, or boat, holding two persons. 



The occupants are shown, as are also the paddles, which project below 

 the horizontal body of the vessel. 



No. }) is a rack for drying skins and fivsh. A pole is added above it, 

 from which are seen floating streamers of calico or cloth. No. c is a 

 fox. No. d is a land otter, while No. e is the hunter's summer habita- 



