148 "Journal of a Voyage through the 



band, might be called trowsers : they, as well as their 

 shoes, are made of dressed moose, elk, or rein-deer skin. 

 The organs of generation they leave uncovered. 



The women differ little in their dress from the men, 

 except in the addition of an apron, which is fastened round 

 the waist, and hangs down to the knees. They are in 

 general of a more lusty make than the other sex, and taller 

 in proportion, but infinitely their inferiors in cleanliness. 

 A black artificial stripe crosses the face beneath the eye, 

 from ear to ear, which I first took for scabs, from the ac- 

 cumulation of dirt on it. Their hair, which is longer than 

 that of the men, is divided from the forehead to the crown, 

 and drawn back in long plaits behind the ears. They have 

 also a few white beads, which they get where they pro- 

 cure their iron : they are from aline to an inch in length, 

 and are worn in their ears, but are not of European manu- 

 facture. These, with bracelets made of horn and bone, 

 compose all the ornaments which decorate their persons. 

 Necklaces of the grisly or white bear's claws, are worn ex- 

 clusively by the men. 



Their arms consist of bows made of cedar, six feet in 

 length, with a short iron spike at one end, and serve occa- 

 sionally as a spear. Their arrows are well made, barbed, 

 and pointed with iron, flint, stone, or bone ; they are 

 feathered, and from two to two feet and an half in length; 

 They have two kinds of spears, but both are double-edged, 

 and of well polished iron ; one of them is about twelve 

 inches long, and two wide ; the other about half the width, 

 and two-thirds of the length ; the shafts of the first are 

 eight feet in length, and the latter six. They have also 

 spears made of bone. Their knives consist of pieces of 

 iron, shaped and handled by themselves. Their axes are 

 something like our adze, and they use them in the same 

 manner as we employ that instrument. They were, in- 

 deed, furnished with iron in a manner that I could not 

 have supposed, and plainly proved to me that their com- 

 munication with those who communicate with the inha- 

 bitants of the sea-coast, cannot be very difficult, and from 

 their ample provision of iron weapons, the means of pro- 

 curing it must be of a more distant origin than I had at first 

 conjectured. 



They have snares made of green skin, which they cut 

 to the size of sturgeon twine, and twist a certain number 

 of them together j and though when completed) they do 



