NELSON] LABRETS 45 
wearing labrets is almost .ost among the Eskimo of the Asiatic coast 
and of St Lawrence island. One:man seen at the latter point had a 
circle tattooed on each side of his chin to represent these ornaments 
(figure 15b). Some of the natives on Mechigme bay, just south of Kast 
cape, Siberia, had labret holes in their lips. The Eskimo of the Yukon 
and the Kuskokwim who live nearest the Tinné have also generally 
abandoned the practice of wearing labrets, and the custom is becoming 
obsolete at other points where there is constant intercourse with the 
whites. 
- During my residence at St Michael it was rather uncommon to 
see very young men among the Unalit with their lips pierced, and 
throughout that time I do not think a single boy among them had been 
thus deformed. Many of the old men also have ceased to wear labrets, 
although the incisions made for them in youth still remain. 
Among the Eskimo of Bering strait and northward, where contact 
with the whites has been irregular, labret wearing is still in full force. 
Increasing intercourse with civilized people makes it only a matter of 
time for this custom to become entirely obsolete. In the district south- 
ward from the Yukon mouth labrets were not universally worn among 
the men, as is the case in the country northward from Bering strait, 
aud in every village some of the men and many women were found 
without them. The labrets of the women are of a curious sickle shape, 
but vary in detail of arrangement, as shown by the accompanying illus- 
trations. Most of them are made with holes in the lower border for 
the attachment of short strings of beads. The women who wore 
labrets had the under lip pierced with one or two holes just over the 
middle of the chin. 
The use of these labrets, in the country visited by me, seemed to be 
limited to the district lying between Yukon and Kuskokwim rivers 
and Nunivak island. Elsewhere I did not see labrets of any kind used 
by women. In the villages of Askinuk, Kushunuk, and other places 
in that region the common form was a small, flattened, sickle-shape 
piece of ivory, with a broad, flattened base for resting against the 
teeth, and the outer tip brought down to a thin, flat point. Of this 
style there are some variations, the most common of which is to have 
the two ordinary sickle-shape labrets joined by a crosspiece of ivory 
cut from the same piece and uniting the two sickle-shape parts just on 
the outer side of the lip. 
Another form was to join the inner ends of the labrets so that the 
portion resting against the teeth united the bases of the two sickle-shape 
points. In a labret (plate xx11, 2) from Konigunugumut the piece 
joining the two sickle-shape points is flattened vertically. In another 
specimen (plate x x11, 3), from Kulwoguwigumut, this crosspiece, uniting 
the bases of the two projections, is flattened horizontally. In another 
(plate xx11, 4) from the lower Kuskokwim, the two sickle-shape projec- 
tions unite exteriorly to the lip so that a single orifice in the middle of 
the lower lip serves for the insertion of the stem. 
