QUEEN CHARLOTTE ISLANDS. 143 B 



angle, with very little appearance of breaking at the corners, and 

 pegged together at the fourth angle. The bottom is made of a sepa- 

 rate piece of wood. The cover is cut out of a solid slab. It rests by a 

 shoulder on the ledge of the box, and expands slightly upward, so 

 that the upper surface of that of the box above mentioned and repre- 

 sented in Pig. 29 is nearly 17 inches square. These boxes are generally 

 decorated externally by designs in black and dull red paint, and are 

 carefully corded with cedar-bark rope, which is so arranged as to meet 

 and tie over the top of the cover when desired. 



Mats, of an oblong form, and plaited rather than woven, from strips Mats, 

 of cedar bark, constitute a great part of the household furniture. 

 They vary much in texture, and may be either of the natural brownish 

 or yellowish colour or diversified by black bands. 



One-handed adzes, with the blade fixed at an •acute angle to the Adzes, 

 handle, are very commonly used. (Fig. 14.) The blade is often an 

 old broad file, sharpened at the end. These, no doubt, replace those of 

 stone of a former day. A few of the stone adze-heads are still to be Stone adzes 

 found about the houses, and are very Avell shaped, and different in 

 form from any I have elsewhere seen. One of these is represented in 

 figure 13. The head somewhat resembles a poll pick in shape, being 

 square in section near the front, but oblong towards the head owing to 

 the increasing breadth, the thickness from side to side remaining the 

 same or nearly so. Near the head, one of the smaller sides is carved 

 into One or two saddle-like hollows to receive the properly shaped end 

 of the handle, which was no doubt lashed firmly to the stone with 

 sinew or bark. The lateral surfaces are sometimes grooved from the 

 head downward for one-third or more of the total length. The 

 dimensions of some specimens are as follows : — 



No. 1.— Length, 1' 1". Breadth, 2". Thickness, 1 f 6 - inches. 

 No. 2.— « n\". « 2". » If". 



No. 3.— " 8 "(about) « 2". " 1 A" • 



The measurements are merely averages, as the sides are not gene- 

 rally strictly parallel, but slope more or less, towards the ends. The 

 material of these tools appears to be a matter of indifference, as I have 

 seen them made of hard altered igneous rocks like those so common in 

 the country, of a hard sandy argillite, and of the peculiar greenish 

 jade which the natives of some other parts of the province prize so 

 highly. This latter material is not, according to the Haidas, found in 

 the islands, but has occasionally been obtained in the course of trade. 



Large stone hammers are still in use for driving home wedges and Hammers, 

 similar operations. No stone arrow-heads were found, and it is pro- 

 bable that these people, before they were acquainted with iron, used 

 bone only for this purpose. 



