300 IN WINTER QUARTERS 



covered with birch-bark ; their sledges also were of 

 precisely the same construction as those of their North 

 European relations. Judging from their clothes, they 

 must have been very poor. Their reindeer were large, 

 and looked healthy. On one occasion one of the women 

 brought a baby, a queer little thing, with black eyes and 

 black hair. The cradle was a wooden box about three 

 inches deep, with rounded ends, almost the shape of the 

 child. The bottom of the box was oval, and projected 

 an inch beyond the box at either side, and three or four 

 inches at each end. A quantity of sawdust lay at the 

 bottom of the box, which was covered with a piece of 

 flannel over the child's legs, and a hare's skin with the 

 fur on over the body. The baby was placed in the box, 

 having on nothing but a short cotton shirt. The flannel 

 was carefully wrapped over its feet and lashed securely, 

 from two places on each side, to a brass ring over its 

 knees. The arms were placed close to the body, and 

 wrapped up with it in the hare's skin, which was secured 

 as before to a brass ring over the breast. Half a hoop of 

 wood, the two ends of which were loosely fastened to the 

 sides of the box, was raised so as to be at an angle of 45° 

 with the bottom of the box ; it was kept in that position 

 by lashings from the top and bottom ; when a handker- 

 chief was thrown over this it formed a hood over the 

 child's head. The little one cried as the complicated 

 operation of being put to bed was performed, but as soon 

 as it was finished the Ostiak woman sat down upon the 

 floor, took the box upon her knee, and quieted the child 

 by giving it the breast. 



On the 28th I added a new bird to my list. I had 

 walked an hour in the forest without seeing a feather. I 

 then all at once dropped upon a little party of tits, in com- 

 pany, as usual, with some pine grosbeaks. I shot at what I 



