MURDOCH.] ARROWS. 201 



Arrotrs. With these bows were used arrows of various patterns 

 adapted for different kinds of game. There are in the collection fifty-one 

 arrows, which are all about the same length, 25 to 30 inches. In describ 

 ing these arrows I shall employ the terms used in modern archery 1 for 

 the parts of the arrow. The greatest variation is in the shape and si/e 

 of the pile. The stele is almost always a straight cylindrical rod, 

 almost invariably 0-4 inch in diameter, and ranging in length from 20 

 to 28 inches. Twenty-five inches is the commonest length, and the 

 short steles, -when not intended for a boy s bow, are generally fitted 

 with an unusually long pile. From the beginning of the feathering the 

 stele is gradually flattened above and below to the nock, which is a 

 simple notch almost always 0-2 inch wide and of the same depth. The 

 stele is sometimes slightly widened just in front of the nock to give a 

 better hold for the fingers. The feathering is G or 7 inches long, con 

 sisting of two, or less often, three feathers. (The set of sixteen arrows 

 from Sidaru, two from Nuwfik, and one from Utkiavwlfi, have three, 

 feathers. The rest of the fifty-one have two.) The shaft of the feather 

 is split and the web is cut nar 

 row, and tapered off to a point 

 !tteachend(Fig.l81). Theends 

 of the feathers are fastened to 



the Stele with whippings of fine &quot; 1*1 Feathering of the Eskimo arrow. 



sinew, the small end of the feather which, of course, comes at the nock, 

 being often wedged into a slit in the wood (with a special tool to be 

 described below), or else doubled back over a few turns of the whip 

 ping and lashed down with the rest. The small end of the feather is 

 almost always twisted about one turn, evidently to make the arrow 

 revolve in flight, like a rifle ball. Generally, if not universally, the 

 feathering was made of the feathers of some bird of prey, falcon, eagle, 

 or raven, probably with some notion of giving to the arrow the death- 

 dealing quality of the bird. Out of the fifty -one arrows in the collec 

 tion, only nine are feathered with gull s feathers, and of these all but 

 two are new, or newly feathered for sale to us. 2 Dr. Simpson 3 says that 

 in his time &quot;feathers for arrows and head-dresses,&quot; probably the eagles 

 feathers previously mentioned, were obtained in trade from the &quot;Nuna- 

 tanmiun.&quot; 



Four kinds of arrows were used : the bear arrow, of which there were 

 three varieties, the deer arrow, the arrow for geese, gulls, and other large 

 fowl, and the blunt headed arrow for killing small birds without man 

 gling them. 



Encyclopedia Britannica, Oth edition, article Archery. 



3 On this subject of using the feathers of birds of prey for arrows, compare Grant?,, History of Green, 

 land, i, p. 146, &quot;the arr \v . . . winded behind with a couple of raven s feathers.&quot; Bessels, 



Naturalist, vol. 18, pt. 9, j 

 511, &quot; Toward the, opposit 

 neatly hushed on ; and K 

 from the primaries of Vr 

 any feathers except those of birds of prey. 

 Op.cit.,p.206. 



HG9 (t lie three arrows at Ita had ravrn s feathers). Parry, 2d Voyage, p. 



end of the arrow are two feathers, generally O f the spotted owl. not very 

 llnlien, Contributions, p. 37, &quot;The feather-vanes were nearly always made 

 x Kcantltaca or Onculut carbo.&quot; The last is the oiilv mention I lind of using 



