GRAPHIC ART OF THE ESKIMOS. 849 



The runners are made to slide easily by fitting to them shoes of clear 

 ice as long as the runners themselves, &quot; fully 1 foot high by G inches 

 thick. The sledge, with these ice runners, is estimated to weigh, even 

 when unloaded, upward of 200 or 300 pounds; but it appears that the 

 smoothness of running more than counterbalances the extra weight.&quot; 1 



The flat sledge is used also for ordinary travel as well as freight, and 

 an illustration of one with ivory runners 

 is shown in fig. 65. 



The difference between these varieties 

 are often very neatly portrayed, as well 

 as other accessories pertaining thereto. 



Doctor Dall furnishes several illustra 

 tions of sledges, 2 one from Norton Sound being like the railed sledge of 

 Point Barrow. Some difference, however, is apparent, and this may 

 naturally influence the portrayal of the vehicle in engravings on ivory. 

 The same author also furnishes the illustration of a Hudson Bay sledge 

 in which the runners are absent, the entire base consisting of birch 

 boards, three of which are laid side by side and secured, and about 12 

 feet long. These are cut thin at one end and turned over like a tobog 

 gan, held down with rawhide, and inside 

 the curve, says Doctor Dall, the voyageur 

 carries his kettle. 

 The railed sledge of the Yukon is some- 



UMIAK. 



what different from the two forms already 

 mentioned, the upper rail rising from the front toward the back, and 

 resembling very much a native sketch of a dog sledge, as shown in fig. 60. 

 The hunter seems to be seated upon the sledge, seeming to indicate that 

 he has no other loads and that the rear projection on the sledge is the 

 high framework shown in the Yukon type. 



In fig. 67 is a native reproduction of a dog sledge made somewhat 

 after the type of the Point Barrow type, 

 though no such drawings have been found 

 in Point Barrow records. The men are both 

 energetically working to aid the dog in mov- Fig - 62 - 



ing the sledge, which seems loaded. The UMIAK&amp;gt; 



dog is well portrayed, the ragged outline no doubt being intended to 

 denote the shaggy coat of hair. 



In his reference to the Eskimo of Melville Peninsula, Captain Parry 

 says : :! 



The distance to which these people extend their inland immigrations and the 

 extent of coast of which they possess a personal knowledge are really very remark 

 able. Of these we could at the time of our first intercourse form no correct judgment, 

 from our uncertainty as to the length of what they call a seenik (sleep), or one day s 



1 Ninth Annual Report of Bureau of Ethnology, 1887-88, 1892, p. 354. 



2 Alaska and its Resources, Boston. 1870, p. 421. 



3 Journal of a Voyage, etc., etc., London: 1821, p. 165. 

 NAT MUS 95 54 



