104 H. P. STEENSBY. 
months of the year. Lyon mentions a sledge journey which, in 1823, was 
made on July 26 on the ice-foot along the island of Iglulik. As wood 
can but rarely be obtained, the sledge runners are for preference made from 
the jawbone of a whale. But specimens of runners made from frozen 
walrus skin are also mentioned. 
The rest of the implements and the cultural objects of the tribe are 
only incidentally mentioned, because they have impressed the observers as 
being more particularly those common to the Eskimo. Parry and Lyon 
mention fire struck with pyrites and by drilling in wood, paddles made of 
fragments of wood lashed together, bows and arrows, and a peculiar form 
of spear for reindeer hunting in water. According to Lyon and RAE these 
Eskimo wear deerskin clothes. At Lyon Inlet Parry found a net of whale- 
bone, regarding which he says that it had large open meshes, two inches 
in diameter, and was made of strips of whalebone lashed together with 
thongs of the same material. As he did not see it in use, and besides, 
found it at a deserted settlement, it was impossible to state whether it had 
been used for fishing or for the capture of the Ringed Seal. It is more 
probable that it was used for the latter purpose. 
It appears that fishery can be carried on at all seasons and with slight 
trouble. Lyon mentions hook-fishing in ice-holes and says that less skill 
is used in procuring fish than any other kind of food. On September 27, 
1822, he saw two boys fish through the ice on a lake, using an ivory fish 
as an artificial bait. HALL observed the same method of fishing on lakes, 
in January 1866 and April 1863. Salmon fishing with a salmon spear in 
open water is recorded from Rae Isthmus in July 1847 and 1868. Rae 
mentions stone dams about '/2 metre in height which are set up at the 
mouth of streams, slightly below high-water mark, to cut off the retreat of 
the salmon during the ebb of the tide. The salmon are caught with a long 
spear, about 2 metres in length, resembling a three-pronged fork, of which 
the side prongs are longer than the middle one, and are, in addition, each 
provided with a barb. 
Four kinds of dwellings are recorded: the tent, which is sometimes said 
to be of reindeer skin, and sometimes of seal or walrus skin; the snow 
house; the house of freshwater ice, or of a combination of freshwater ice 
and skin, dwelt in during autumn before there is snow enough to build a 
snow house; and lastly the more solid winter house of stone and bone. 
Such a house is recorded both from Iglulik and from Repulse Bay. On a 
group of islets at the head of the latter bay Parry found no less than 60 
houses built of stone; the stones were laid one above the other in regular circles 
21/2—3 metres in diameter. At Iglulik the lower part of similar houses were 
built of stone, and the upper part of whale and walrus bones, which slanted 
inwards and met at the top. The interstices between the bones and the 
whole of the outer side were covered with turf, and, during winter, with 
snow in addition. The entrance faced south, and consisted of a passage 
3 metres long and 0.6 metre high, made of flat stones, which were likewise 
