HOFFMAN] 



ARROW-MAKING 



277 



By means of a knife the bark was scraped off, and sometimes sufficient 

 of tlie wood to reduce tbe diameter to the required size — ordinarily 

 three-eighths of an inch. If no pieces of glass were at hand, a piece 

 of sandstone was sometimes taken to further reduce the roughness of 

 the shaft, and then tine sand was placed in a piece of blanket or buck- 

 skin and employed as sandpaper is used. 



In some instances flat pieces of bone with rounded notches on the 

 edge, or even holes of the diameter required for the shaftment, were 

 used for further smoothing and rounding. The stick was then cut to 

 the required length, varying from 22 to 23 inches. 



A cut was then made with a small saw, or a knife blade filed into a 

 saw, at one end of the shaft to receive the tang of the arrowhead, the 



Fig. 50 — Apache iron point. 



incision being from one-half to three-fourths of an inch in depth. Then 

 the other end of the shaftment was gradually tapered for about 3 inches, 

 to within one-fourth of an inch of the end, which bulb or nock was left 

 expanding, with a square parallel sided, or probably sometimes an 

 angular notch at the end. 



The arrow tang was inserted and carefully wrapped with a thin, flat 

 baud of sinew (figure 50), which was then smoothed down with glue to 

 insure adhesion. When dry, the creases, of which there were three, were 

 made to extend from the sinew straight down the shaftment for 10 or 11 

 inches (plate xxxi, b). These creases were made with a sharp-pointed 

 piece of iron — the end of a broken blade — or a piece of glass, and is 

 believed to permit the discharge of blood from the wound. The feathers 



Fig. 51 — Arrowabaft showing mode of feathering. 



having been prepared are next attached lengthwise, beginning where 

 the creases cease and extending back to the nock. Only the top and 

 bottom of the feathers are touched with glue, the intervening portion 

 of the length of each being free and detached. Sinew fibers are then 

 wrapped around the shaftment to hold down the ends of the feathers — 

 each end being about an inch long, from which the web has been 

 removed — and the glue-stick applied to fasten them. The feathers 

 are equidistant around the shaftment (figure 51). 



There is another step in arrow-making, which is seldom taken in the 

 manufacture of arrows in North America. To prevent the detached 

 portions of the feathers from being forcibly or accidentally torn from 



