DESCRIPTIONS OF THE PLATES BONE IMPLEMENTS, ETC. 55 



In B. Plate VI. there are also other supposed Fishing- Implements, namely 

 harpoon-like weapons, barbed on one side, similar to those above-mentioned, but 

 diminutive, and, as it were, in miniature rather than fit for real use. They may, 

 however, have been used as Arrow-heads. 



There are also figured in the same Plate some small rod-like pieces of bone, sub- 

 cylindrical, and tapering at both ends (figs. 10-15). Mr. Henry Christy thought 

 that these little bone spikes, or spindle-shaped and skewer-like implements, may 

 have been used by being tied on obliquely to the end of a longer stick or stem, after 

 the fashion of a Fish-hook. He possessed in his Collection modern Fish-hooks so 

 made, by the fastening together of two pieces of bone, unequal in length, at a sharp 

 angle. Sir John Lubbock has also some, which were presented to him by a person 

 who saw them in use among the natives on the north-west coast of America. 



Mr. H. Christy also thought it highly probable that these spikes of bone may have 

 been used in the construction of some such kind of Fish-hook as is used at 

 Nootka. Sound at the present day, and many examples of which are to be seen in 

 his own and other Collections. Such thin tapering pieces of wood or bone are 

 tied securely, at a certain angle, on the thicker part, and within the curve, of a 

 stick bent like a shepherd's crook. Sometimes the spikes are sharp at both ends, 

 but more often they are blunt at the outer end. Sometimes the framework is of 

 solid wood and the spike or tongue of iron. These curious fishing-implements are 

 of different sizes ; a small one is drawn in fig. 14. How they are used, except 

 that they are suspended by a line attached to a certain point nearly in the middle 

 of the upper part, we have no certain knowledge. 



We must, however, also remark that in an Arrow-stem, made of a kind of reed, 

 which has been given to us as coming from Oriental Siberia, the terminal armature 

 consists of a simple spike or sharp rod of bone (probably the bony ray of the back- 

 fin of some large fish), rounded and equally pointed at both ends (fig. 15). One 

 of these points is set in the hollow shaft, and is tightly held by a ligature round 

 the edge of this natural socket. We may add that in these kinds of Arrow-heads 

 a piece of Whalebone attached to the stem a little below the point, and spreading 

 out at its end, serves as a barb to retain the weapon in a wound. This is well 

 shown in the annexed sketch (fig. 15), of the actual size. It is true that the 

 analogous specimens represented in B. Plate VI. are much smaller ; but we shall 

 in the sequel have occasion to figure some of larger size. Whether or not these 

 support the interpretation proposed at first, it is probably the best at all events 

 for the two-pointed instruments figured in B. Plate VI., of which we now proceed 

 to give a detailed description. 



