LITTLE BOREAS 'S PLA YTHINGS. 57 



taken out, the only idea of value among 

 the Eskimo being the present necessity 

 for an article. A needle that is wanted 

 for use immediately is more valuable in 

 their eyes than the horn cup which holds 

 it, although it may have taken them a 

 month to make the cup. 



The making of these curious cups of 

 musk-ox horn is worth relating. If my 

 readers will look in some well-illustrated 

 book on natural history, they will see 

 that the horn of a musk-ox, as it ap- 

 proaches his head, commences to flatten 

 out in a wide plate that is crimpled 

 at the edges. The Eskimo take this 

 widened base of the musk-oxen's horn, 

 boil it in their kettles, and then scrape 

 it with knives to get it into the proper 

 thickness, after which it is bent in the 

 shape seen in the illustration, and is then 



