Ethnographical collections fi'om East Greenland. 407 



large, that Ihe trapper himself can sit in it whilst on the watch; on 

 the top is placed the bait for the birds, above a thin, transparent 

 lump of frozen snow. When the bird settles down to feed, its legs 

 break through the snow and it can be taken by the watcher with 

 the hands. Then the hole is covered with fresh snow and the bait^). 

 Or he may also place a snare with the bait (blubber) close outside 

 a small opening in the snow hut. In Sermilik Fjord it was also the 

 custom to build up similar hut-traps of stone and turf (chiefly for 

 the capture of ravens)^). Gulls are also caught on a bone stick (10 

 to 15 cm. in length) from the bone of a bear, on which a piece of 

 blubber is fixed. This swims on the water on a long line. The 

 gull swallows the bone with the blubber and the bone stick cross- 

 ways in its neck. The watching hunter then easily kills it with his 

 weapon. Cf. pp. 55—56, and fig. 175 a and b. 



Ptarmigan are often killed by stones (mittertoq) but also in 

 traps (pusisarter) or snares {napiarter). 



Salmon and sea-scorpions (pp. 53 — 54) are fished from the 

 shore or on the ice with spears of various types (kanneen; kaki- 

 paain). Salmon dams (saputaatät) are laid down at the mouth of 

 rivers or at their outlet from the inland lakes; they consist of long 

 rows of stones, lying in such shallow water that they reach above 

 the surface and at short distances from each other, forming open- 

 ings through which the fish are obliged to go, when chased. I have 

 seen such dams both in a lake around the head of a river just over 

 the fall west of the colony at Tasiusaq, and at the inner end of an 

 inlet around the mouth of a rivulet, close by the summer place at 

 Qingaaq. 



HUNTING WEAPONS. 



The harpoons (used in hunting the seals, walrus and whales) 

 belong to the Eskimo's large class of stunning or half-killing weap- 

 ons; like the fish-hooks and snares they are more intended to catch 

 hold of than to kill the animal. The characteristic feature of the 

 harpoon in contrast to the lance and dart is the loosely attached 

 head at its front end, a barbed toggle head made of bone. When the 



1) O. Fabricius (1818) p. 240 mentions quite the same methods of hunting for West 



Greenland. 

 ') Compare what is told of Misana and the fox-and-raven trap in the tale of 



Imerasugsuk (in this volume p. 236). Cf. Thostrup (1911) pp. 233—235. 



