390 THE POINT BARROW ESKIMO. 
decoration appears to be applied almost solely to the clothing, while 
tools and utensils are usually left plain, and if ornamented are only 
adorned with carving or incised lines.!. West of the Mackenzie River, 
and especially south of Bering Strait, Eskimo decorative art reaches 
its highest development, as shown by the collections in the National 
Museum. Not only is everything finished with the most extreme care, 
but all wooden objects are gaily painted with various pigments, and all 
articles of bone and ivory are covered with ornamental caryings and 
incised lines forming conventional patterns. 
There are in the collections also many objects that appear to have 
been made simply for the pleasure of exercising the ingenuity in repre- 
senting natural or fanciful objects, and are thus purely works of art. 
Want of space forbids any further discussion of these interesting 
objects. There is in the Museum sufficient material for a large mono- 
graph on Eskimo art. As would naturally be expected, art at Point 
Barrow occupies a somewhat intermediate position between the highly 
developed art of the southwest and the simple art of the east. I have 
given sufficient figures in my description of their clothing and various 
implements to illustrate the condition of purely decorative art. A few 
words may be added by way of résumé. It will be noticed that when- 
ever the bone or ivory parts of weapons are decorated the ornamenta- 
tion is usually in the form of incised lines colored with red ocher or 
soot. These lines rarely represent any natural objects, but generally 
form rather elegant conventional patterns, most commonly double or 
single borders, often joined by oblique cross lines or fringed with short, 
pointed parallel lines. 
A common ornament is the incised ‘circle and dot,” so often referred 
to in the foregoing descriptions. This is a circle about one-quarter inch 
in diameter, described as accurately as if done with compasses, with a 
deeply incised dot exactly in the center. This ornament is much more 
common south of Bering Strait, where, as Mr. L. M. Turner informs 
me, it is a conventionalized representation of a flower. Some of the 
older implements in our collection, ornamented with this figure, may 
have been obtained by trade from the southern natives, but the Point 
Barrow people certainly know how to make it, as there are a number of 
ew 9 
newly made articles in the collection thus ornamented. Unfortunately, 
we saw none of these objects in the process of manufacture, as they 
were made by the natives during odd moments of leisure, and at the 
time I did not realize the importance of finding ont the process. No 
tool by which these figures could be made so accurately was ever offered 
for sale. 
Neither Mr. Turner nor Mr. Dall, both of whom, as is well known, spent 
long periods among the natives of the Yukon region, ever observed 
the process of making this ornament. The latter, however, suggests 
that it is perhaps done with an improvised centerbit, made by sticking 
1See the various accounts of the eastern Eskimo already referredto. 
