562 



REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1888. 



use. A bunch of willow twigs, the down of which is used as tinder, 

 is also shown (fig. 31). 

 This set is especially interesting, because it shows the degeneration 



of an art. The fire-drill is so rarely 

 used at Point Barrow, Mr. John 

 Murdoch says, that it was not pos- 

 sible to get a full set devoted to 

 tbat purpose. Those here shown 

 are a make-shift. The method only 

 survives by the conservatism of a 

 few old men of the tribe, who still 

 cling to old usages. One of these 

 made the drill for Lieutenant Kay, 

 telling him that it was the kind 

 used in old times. It seems primi- 

 tive enough; the knuckle-bone 

 might well have been the first 

 mouth-piece. The Eskimo farther 

 east sometimes use a fish vertebra 

 for the same purpose; one from the 

 Anderson River has this. The cord 

 without handles is undoubtedly the 

 earliest form also. 



The small wooden and bone 

 mouth-pieces of the Eskimo east 

 of Point Barrow to Cumberland 

 Gulf seem to be copies of the deer 

 knuckle-bone. Another primitive 

 adaptation is found in an Anderson 

 Riv^er bow, which is made of the 

 fibula of a deer (see fig. 30). 



The fire- making drill collected 

 from the Chukchis by the Vega ex- 

 pedition in the Cape Wankerem re- 

 gion, in northeastern Siberia, about 

 the same latitude as Point Bar- 

 row, is figured in Nordenskiold's 

 Report.* It is worked by a bow, 

 and the drill turns in a mouth- 

 ])iece of a deer astragalus like the 

 Point Barrow specimen. The block 

 has central holes, with short 

 grooves running into each one. 



Nordenskiold's description of the 

 manner of making fire is very de- 



Fig. 31. 

 FiKE-MAKiNO Set (with mouthpiece of deer's 

 knuckle-boiie, thong, and tinder of willow cat- 

 kin.-) 



Eskimo of Point Barrow, Alaska. 

 t. P. H. Ray, \J. S, A, ) 



(Cat. No. 81)822.- U. S. N. M. 

 Collepted by Lieu 



*Nordenskiold. — Vo3\age of the Vega. 

 London, 1881. ii, 121, 128. 



