NELSON] TALISMANS AND AMULETS 435 
Frequently the virtue is inherent in the object, but sometimes is secured 
by means of a shaman’s power or the aid of one who knows. In addi- 
tion to the ordinary in-gukh, or fetich, an heirlocm (paituk) may become 
a fetich by reason of its extreme age and long possession in one family. 
Such objects are treasured and are handed down from father to son. 
They are supposed to be endowed with reason and to be gifted with 
supernatural powers to aid and protect their owners. 
With these objects may be classed such things as are used for 
obtaining success in the hunt—like the dried bodies of newborn 
infants already described, and others which are Supposed to protect 
their owners from bodily injury. 
Women wear belts made from the incisors of reindeer taken out with 
a small fragment of bone, and attached scale-like to a rawhide strap, 
overlapping each other in a continuous series. When one of these 
belts has been in the family a long time, it is believed to acquire a cer- 
tain virtue for curing disease. In case of rheumatic or other pains the 
part affected is struck smartly a number of times with the end of the 
belt and the difficulty is supposed to be relieved. 
While at St Michael a shaman sent to me on one occasion to borrow 
the skin of a pine squirrel, brought from the head of the Yukon, which 
he used in his conjuring to cure a sick man, and claimed to drive into 
the squirrel the sickness from the person afflicted, after which the skin 
was returned to me. 
Another method of curing local pain, such as neuralgia, toothache, 
or similar affections, is for the shaman to suck the skin over the spot 
vigorously for a time, and then take a small bone or other object out of 
his mouth, showing it to the patient as the cause of the trouble. 
Dogs are never beaten for biting a person, asit is claimed that should 
this be done the inua of the dog would become angry and prevent the 
wound from healing. During my stay at St Michael a little girl four 
or five years of age was brought to me to dress her face, which had 
been badly torn by a savage dog. I told the father that he ought to 
kill such an animal, to which he replied in alarm, “No, no; that would 
be very bad for the child; the wound would not heal.” 
As arule, married women are very anxious to have a son, and in case 
of long continued barrenness they consult a shaman, who commonly 
makes, or has the husband make, a small, doll-like image over which 
he performs certain secret rites, aud the woman is directed to sleep 
with it under her pillow. 
A Kaviagmut from Sledge island, who killed two men on Norton 
sound during my stay at St Michael, once came to have me cure some 
sores on his back. When he removed his clothing, I saw that he had 
on a curious harness-like arrangement of round rawhide cords which 
went loosely about his neck and, dividing on the chest and back, 
formed a loop under each arm. On inquiring the meaning of this, he 
replied that it was to protect him from his enemies. This referred to 
his fear of blood revenge by relatives of the men he had killed, 
