60 THE POINT HARROW ESKIMO. 



Ocean. This wood is sufficiently abundant to furnish the natives with 

 all they need for fuel and other purposes, and consists chiefly of pine, 

 spruce, and cotton wood, mostly in the form of water- worn logs, often of 

 large size. Of late years, also, much wood of the different kinds used 

 in shipbuilding has drifted ashore from wrecks. 



MINERALS. 



The people of this region are acquainted witli few mineral substances, 

 excluding the metals which they obtain from the whites. The most 

 important are flint, slate, soap-stone, jade, and a peculiar form of massive 

 pectolite, first described by Prof. F. W. Clarke 1 from specimens brought 

 home by our party. Flint, anma, was formerly in great demand for 

 arrow and spear heads and other implements, and according to Dr. 

 Simpson 2 was obtained from the Nunatafimiun. It is generally black 

 or a slightly translucent gray, but we collected a number of arrowheads, 

 etc., made of jasper, red or variegated. A few crystals of transparent 

 quartz, sometimes smoky, were also seen, and appeared to be used as 

 amulets. Slate, ulu ksu, &quot;material for a round knife,,&quot; was used, as its 

 name imports, for making the woman s round knife, and for harpoon 

 blades, etc. It is a smooth clay slate, varying in hardness, and light 

 green, red, purple, dark gray, or black in color. All the pieces of soft 

 gray soap-stone, tuna kti?, which are so common at both villages, are 

 probably fragments of the lamps and kettles obtained in former years 

 from the eastern natives. The jade is often very beautiful, varying 

 from a pale or bright translucent green to a dark olive, almost black, 

 and was formerly used for making adzes, whetstones, and occasionally 

 other implements. The pectolite, generally of a pale greenish or bluish 

 color, was only found in the form of oblong, more or less cylindrical 

 masses, used as hammerheads. Both of these minerals were called 

 kau dlo, and were said to come &quot;from the east, a long way off,&quot; from 

 high rocky ground, but all that we could learn was very indefinite. 

 Dr. Simpson was informed :1 that the stones for making whetstones were 

 brought from the Kuwiik River, so that this jade is probably the same 

 as that which is said to form Jade Mountain, in that region. 



Bits of porphyry, syenite, and similar rocks are used for making 

 labrets, and large pebbles are used as hammers and net sinkers. They 

 have also a little iron pyrites, both massive and in the form of spherical 

 concretions. The latter were said to come from the mouth of the Col- 

 ville, and are believed by the natives to have fallen from the sky. Two 

 other kinds of stone are brought from the neighborhood of Nu rasfiknan, 

 partly, it appears, as curiosities, and partly with some ill defined mysti 

 cal notions. The first are botryoidal masses of brown limonite, resemb 

 ling bog iron ore, and the other sort curious concretions, looking like the 

 familiar &quot;clay stones,&quot; but very heavy, and apparently containing a 



1 U. S. Geol. Surv., Bull. 9, p. 9, 1884. 3 0p. cit,, p. 266. 3 Op. cit., p. 266. 



