30 
IN FORBIDDEN SEAS 
the neck, were trimmed with narrow strips of fur- 
seal skin. In shape the par ha was like a large 
shirt. It was put on over the head, and had an 
opening halfway down the front. At the neck it 
was fastened by strings, on the ends of which were 
ornaments made of puffins’ beaks and a small piece 
of fur. A girdle of sea-lion hide was used by the 
men to tie in at the waist. The women generally 
wore theirs loose, and it was made longer than 
the men’s, because, I suppose, they did not wear 
trousers as a rule. The overhanging fold above the 
girdle was used instead of a pocket. It was a 
receptacle for everything. In bringing off skins to 
trade, they would invariably be stowed away inside 
their parka , and produced one at a time; and when 
the bartering power of that one skin was exhausted, 
another would be produced, and so on. Everything 
got in exchange, that would go inside this garment, 
was put there, and it was common to see tins of 
powder, boxes of caps, pieces of lead, tobacco, tea, 
sugar, cooked rice, beef and pork, old shirts and 
trousers, etc., all stowed away, indiscriminately 
mixed up, around a man’s waist. Sometimes they 
would bring off sea-fowls’ eggs, and not a few would 
get broken. The state of things inside their parka 
can be imagined. For lower garments they wore 
trousers which, when they could not obtain any old 
ones in trade, were made of birdskins also. Trousers 
and shirts were much in demand ; but coats, waist¬ 
coats, hats, and boots, were comparatively useless 
to them. A cap of sealskin, and moccasins reaching 
to the knee, the uppers made of sea-lion or seal 
hide, and the feet of the rubber-like skin of sea-lion 
flippers, completed their outfit. One or two of the 
