218 INTRODUCTION OF DOMESTIC REINDEER INTO ALASKA. 



tlayod a walrus alive and threw the suffering- creature back again into 

 the sea, in the hope that they would secure it in due tinie after it had 

 gained a new skin. 



Utensih and dii^/u'.s. — The seal-oil lamp serves as a stove during the 

 winter, while in the summer a fire is kindled from small pieces of drift- 

 wood. Over the blaze iron or tin kettles are suspended, holding meat 

 and a little water. From the kettle the food is placed in long narrow 

 and shallow wooden tra^^s. There are trays of small dimensions, some 

 of which are of greater depth, resembling wooden bowls. There are 

 also wooden cup and saucers. Imported tin spoons are used, as well as 

 imported teakettles, teapots, and buckets. The women of the house- 

 hold cut the meat off from the bone or slice large pieces of it into 

 smaller ones, using a knife fashioned like a meat chopper — not like a 

 butcher's cleaver. About the various trap's the members of the family 

 sit down or recline, and help themselves to the food, using their fin- 

 gers. The tra3^s are cleaned sometimes b}^ wiping them off' with grass, 

 while at other times they may be rinsed off with water. 



Dressing skins. — The men remove the skins as well as cut the meat 

 from the bones of walruses, but the women generally look after these 

 matters with respect to the seals. The blubber is carefully scraped from 

 the skin, and urine is then rubbed into the skin, which is dried, 

 stretched on a wooden frame near the lamp, the hair turned from the 

 blaze. If water boots are to be made, the hair is removed from the 

 skin before the latter is dried. After two or three days the hard 

 lumps on the surface of the skin are removed ))v means of a 4vnife, 

 after the skin has been moistened with urine. Soap is used, if avail- 

 able, for cleaning fur, but seldom if ever for cleaning skin. If the 

 hair is removed from seal skin, the latter is frequently bleached by 

 the sun and the cold air. The hair is partly allowed to rot off from 

 walrus skin, then a knife makes the surface clean, after which the skin 

 is stretched on a large frame and separated into two thin skins and 

 exposed to the sun for several days. It is used for the roofs of houses 

 and for the covering of canoes. Rope is also made from it. Deer 

 skins are received in trade from the Indian Point natives, sometimes 

 dressed, ])ut not always so. Deer skins, after being scraped and cured, 

 arc frequently d3'ed bj^ means of reddish clay. 



Tattooing. — Males are not decorated in this wiiy. When a girl 

 reaches her ninth year or thereabouts, she is subjected to this painful 

 ordeal by her mother. By means of a sharpened nail and some seal 

 oil and soot, three vertical lines are drawn on the chin and three semi- 

 circular lines on the lower part of each cheek. These lines follow the 

 stereotyped pattern. I^ater there are other lines on the sides of the 

 face and on the nose, according to the desires of the mother or other rela- 

 tives. An unusual event, such as the capture of a whale by her father, 

 is designated on her cheek by suitable lines, which advertise her father's 



