24 NATURAL HISTORY OF ARCTIC AMERICA. 



twelve years of age. Yery small children are dressed in a fawn-skin 

 jacket without attached hood; but their heads are, nevertheless, well 

 bundled up in a double fawn-skin hood that fits the scalp closely. This 

 hood is never removed, except perchance by accident, till the child out- 

 grows it. The lower extremities are usually not clad at all. 



The children are carried on the mother's back inside her jacket. The 

 cut of the jacket is such that the child goes down as far as the mother's 

 waist, when the closeness of the jacket prevents it going any farther. 

 The hood allows the child freedom for its arms and head, but the legs 

 are cramped underneath its body, and this is probably one cause of 

 bow-leggedness and possibly the sh^-tness of the lower extremities. I 

 have seen the Eskimo mother, with a child fast asleep in her hood, build- 

 ing a toopik. This work often necessitated her stooping over so much 

 as to seemingly endanger the dumping of the infant over her head on 

 the ground ; still, it did not seem to inconvenience the child in the least, 

 as it slept soundly through the whole proceeding. 



The Mmik, or, as generally pronounced, humming, or boots, are prin- 

 cipally made from the skins of adult Pagomys fcetidus, with the hair off, 

 the soles being made from the skin of PJwca barbata. For winter wear 

 a very beautiful and serviceable boot is made from the skin of reindeer 

 legs sewed together lengthwise ; they are used only in dry snow, being 

 quite useless when the snow is wet. Another style of boot is* to have 

 the leg of netsick skin, but with the hair on. These boots reach nearly 

 to the knee, and are kept in place by means of a string around the top, 

 and also secured by a seal-skin cord passing over the instep and around 

 the heel. They are generally sewed with sinews from reindeer ; but for 

 boots the sinews from the dorsal vertebrae of Beluga catodon are pre- 

 ferred when they can be procured. 



The stocking worn next to the foot is of heavy reindeer skin, the hair 

 side next the foot ; they reach above the knee. Over the stocking is 

 worn a sort of slipper made from the eider-duck. The bird is skinned 

 by making an incision on the back near one wing ; through this open- 

 ing the body is removed. The skin is cleaned of the fat by the Eskimo's 

 teeth, and the skin farther prepared by chewing it. The tail-feathers 

 are removed, and this end becomes the toe of the slipper, the feather 

 side being worn inside. Its upper edges are bound with some kind of 

 skin to give it additional strength, and if the entire slipper is covered 

 with cloth will last a long time. They are very warm and comfortable. 

 Larus glaucus is often used for this purpose. For children they use Uria 

 grylle and Rissa tridactylus skins. Over all this is worn another slipper 



