48 TRIBES OF BRITISH NORTH AMERICA 



it is struck by the weights or entangled in the 

 strings.&quot; 



A favourite method of catching gulls depends 

 entirely on the quickness of the hunter, who has 

 concealed himself in a small snow house, one block 

 of the roof of which is made from a thin, transpa 

 rent piece of ice to support the bait. When a bird 

 settles on this thin ice, the trapper quickly pushes 

 his hand through, seizes the creature, and drags 

 it into the hut. By far the greater number of 

 birds are caught in the moulting season, partridges 

 by hand, and waterfowl after pursuit with the 

 kayak. Swimming birds dive as soon as the boat 

 comes near them ; immediately they .are pursued, 

 and time after time are driven down whenever 

 they attempt to breathe at the surface ; eventually 

 they are drowned, and the bodies float on the 

 water. 



Fish, among which the salmon is very plentiful, 

 are harpooned, taken by ivory fishing hooks, or 

 chipped out of blocks of ice in which they have 

 become deposited at the freezing of a small lake, 

 which may have been converted into a solid mass of 

 ice. The scraping, chewing, and drying of skins 

 is one of the chief employments of women, and so 

 careful are they, that no part of the carcase is 

 wasted, and even the intestines of a seal are made 

 to furnish transparent waterproofs, which are, of 

 course, very light and convenient to carry. Drift 

 wood from the seashore is used in making bows and 

 sledges, while the antlers of the reindeer help to 

 form smooth runners, and the sinews give elasticity 

 to wooden bows. Knives, scrapers, hooks, utensils, 



