22 PREHISTORIC FISHING. 



with the socket. In launching the hai'poon at a seal, which is done by means of 

 the throwing-board, the head becomes detached, remaining in the body of the 

 animal, which dives under, pulling down the embarrassing float, but reappears 

 after a while on the surface, when the pursuing hunters in their skin-boats 

 (bidarkas) finally kill it with clubs. The animal is claimed by the individual 

 who first struck it; but if two have fastened simultaneously their spears in its 

 body, the one who wounded it nearest the head becomes the owner. 



Fig. 21 represents a lighter kind of seal-harpoon, derived from Eskimos at 

 the mouth of Yukon River, Alaska. It somewhat resembles the one just 

 described, but lacks the buoy, and is feathered at the lower end. The hunter 

 likewise employs the throwing-board in connection with this harpoon, which 

 measures about five feet. The ivory head has five barbs, two on one side and 

 three on the other. The line, passing through the eye of the head, and properly 

 attached to it, is fastened below the socket and at some distance from the feather- 

 ing. When the head is buried in the seal's body and has become detached from 

 the shaft, the latter floats in a direction crossing that in which the animal swims 

 or dives, and thus impedes its motions. 



Arrows, in every respect similar to this kind of spear, but, of course smaller 

 (about two feet eight inches long), and having a notch at the lower end of the 

 shaft, are used for the water-hunt by Eskimos of the Northwest Coast, for 

 instance by those of Bristol Bay. When the arrow has reached its victim, and 

 the point has come off the shaft, the latter floats like that of the seal-spear just 

 described. These arrows are shot from short bows, stiffened on the back with 

 whalebone and sinew, and not easily bent. 



I have given a somewhat detailed account of these harpoons and arrows 

 with detachable heads, because it has been suggested the harpoon-like heads 

 from the French caves, which nearly all show a tapering termination, served, in 

 part at least, as detachable armatures. The projections or knobs at their lower 

 ends, it is supposed, facilitated the fastening of a line. If such really was the 

 case, the dart must have been inserted into a conical cavity at the upper extrem- 

 ity of the shaft, for no horn or bone sockets made for receiving the tapering ends 

 of the dart-heads have been found in the French caves. It would be hazardous 

 to assert that the cave-men of Dordogne made use of an apparatus so complicated 

 as an Eskimo seal-spear, their attacks being chiefly directed against large fish, 

 such as salmon and the like. No one can say whether their fish-spears had 

 detachable or fixed points. In the latter case the knobs with which the dart- 

 heads are provided may simply have served to hold ligatures by which the head, 

 after being inserted into the hollowed end of the shaft, was more firmly lashed 

 to it. Yet armatures like those represented by Figs. 17 and 18 certainly have 

 the appearance of detachable heads. 



It will be seen hereafter that certain North American Indians, in capturing 



