190 A JOURNEY TO THE 



1771. Straits. The double-bladed paddle is in universal use among 

 'all the tribes of this people. 



Their tents are made of parchment deer-skins in the hair, 

 and are pitched in a circular form, the same as those of the 

 Esquimaux in Hudson's Bay. These tents are undoubtedly 

 no more than their Summer habitations, for I saw the remains 

 of two miserable hovels, which, from the situation, the structure, 

 and the vast quantity of bones, old shoes, scraps of skins, and 

 other rubbish lying near them, had certainly been some of their 

 Winter retreats. These houses were situated on the South 

 side of a hill ; one half of them were under-ground, and the 

 upper parts closely set round with poles, meeting at the top 

 in a conical form, like their Summer-houses or tents. These 

 tents, [168] when inhabited, had undoubtedly been covered with 

 skins ; and in Winter entirely overspread with the snow-drift, 

 which must have greatly contributed to their warmth. They 

 were so small, that they did not contain more than six or eight 

 persons each ; and even that number of any other people 

 would have found them but miserable habitations. 



Their household furniture chiefly consists of stone kettles, 

 and wooden troughs of various sizes ; also dishes, scoops, and 

 spoons, made of the buffalo or musk-ox horns. Their kettles 

 are formed of a pepper and salt coloured stone ; and though 

 the texture appears to be very coarse, and as porous as a drip- 

 stone, yet they are perfectly tight, and will sound as clear as 

 a china bowl. Some of those kettles are so large as to be 

 capable of containing five or six gallons ; and though it is 

 impossible these poor people can perform this arduous work 

 with any other tools than harder stones, yet they are by far 

 superior to any that I had ever seen in Hudson's Bay ; every 

 one of them being ornamented with neat mouldings round the 

 rim, and some of the large ones with a kind of flute-work at 

 each corner. In shape they were a long square, something 

 wider at the top than bottom, like a knife-tray, and strong 

 handles of the solid stone were left at each end to lift them up. 



