Ethnographical collections from East Greenland. 457 



part of the skin together, when the bladder is filled with air 

 (see fig. 154). This feature has wandered round from East Green- 

 land to the southern part of the west coast and been adopted by 

 the South Greenlanders. 



Further, there are bladder floats of different kinds for different 

 uses. The small float for towing thin or weakly seals has 

 already been mentioned (p. 48) ^). It is blown up through a short 

 thick tube, which is permanently fixed in an opening in the 

 head end of the bladder (fig. 155 a). — Still smaller is the bladder, 

 which is attached to the bladder dart. This is not fixed directly on 

 to the shaft, but on to the end of the long, thin pipe itself, through 

 which the bladder is blown up; at the other end of this pipe in 

 a leaf-shaped widening are two holes for the line (figs. 125 and 

 155 b, the latter defective below) by means of which this cylindrical 

 piece of bone is lashed on the shaft of the dart (see fig. 105). 

 The blow-hole is quite short; it is seen in the figure to open 

 at the side of the cylindrical bone, a little below the groove 

 round the rim. The other opening of the pipe is in the flat end- 

 surface. — Lastly, I may just recall here the specially large bladder, 

 which was used in earlier days in the whale hunting and which 

 was "made strong by means of good amulets" ^). They were owned 

 by but few men and still fewer understood the art of making them. 

 They were made (in West Greenland, see Glahn)-^) from the skins 

 of the bearded seal or Greenland seals; the hair was not stripped 

 off. The head-end was made the back part of the bladder, so that 

 the hind paws pointed forward while moving through the water. 

 Through a small hole at the tail was inserted a rod almost as thick 

 as the arm and a foot long. This was placed cross-wise in the blad- 

 der and the hole well bound round it. To blow it up a tube of 

 wood or bone was inserted through an opening in one of the front 

 paws (hindmost part of the bladder). — A whaling float of the type 

 described here was found in Alaska by Murdoch^). 



Fig. 156 shows the two kinds of wooden pegs, which fasten the 

 single (a) and the double bladder (b) to the kaiak deck, both found 

 at the "dead house." b (which has the longest prong broken at the 

 end) may be regarded as a specialized type, derived from the smaller 

 and more original type a. The head-like end of the latter is pro- 

 duced by a broad hollow, which forms a bed for the cross-strap 

 on the deck under which the peg is placed; in the top of the head 



1) It is illustrated in Vol. X of "Meddelelser om Grønland," PI. XIV. 

 ^) Glahn: Grønlændernes Skikke ved Hvalfiskeriet (1784) p. 278 et seq. 

 3) Glahn (1771) pp. 256—258. 

 *) iMurdoch (1892) p. 246, fig. 249. 



