The Native Races (Complete 5 Part Edition). Hubert Howe Bancroft
Pauw, Recherches Phil., tom. i., p. 262. They have 'small, wild-looking eyes, large and very foul teeth, the hair generally black, but sometimes fair, and always in extreme disorder.' Brownell's Ind. Races, p. 467. 'As contrasted with the other native American races, their eyes are remarkable, being narrow and more or less oblique.' Richardson's Nar., vol. i., p. 343. Expression of face intelligent and good-natured. Both sexes have mostly round, flat faces, with Mongolian cast. Hooper's Tuski, p. 223.
20. 'Allowed to hang down in a club to the shoulder.' Richardson's Pol. Reg., p. 305. Hair cut 'close round the crown of the head, and thereby, leaving a bushy ring round the lower part of it.' Beechey's Voy., vol. i., p. 345. 'Their hair is straight, black, and coarse.' Seemann's Voy. Herald, vol. ii., p. 51. A fierce expression characterized them on the Mackenzie River, which 'was increased by the long disheveled hair flowing about their shoulders.' Armstrong's Nar., p. 149. At Kotzebue Sound 'their hair was done up in large plaits on each side of the head.' Beechey's Voy., vol. i., p. 360. At Camden Bay, lofty top-knots; at Point Barrow, none. At Coppermine River the hair is worn short, unshaven on the crown, and bound with strips of deer-skin. Simpson's Nar., pp. 121, 157. Some of the men have bare crowns, but the majority wear the hair flowing naturally. The women cut the hair short in front, level with the eyebrows. At Humphrey Point it is twisted with some false hair into two immense bows on the back of the head. Hooper's Tuski, p. 225. 'Their hair hangs down long, but is cut quite short on the crown of the head.' Kotzebue's Voy., vol. i., p. 210. Hair cut like 'that of a Capuchin friar.' Seemann's Voy. Herald, vol. ii., p. 51.
21. Crantz says the Greenlanders root it out. 'The old men had a few gray hairs on their chins, but the young ones, though grown up, were beardless.' Beechey's Voy., vol. i., p. 332. 'The possession of a beard is very rare, but a slight moustache is not infrequent.' Seemann's Voy. Herald, vol. ii., p. 51. 'As the men grow old, they have more hair on the face than Red Indians.' Richardson's Nar., vol. i., p. 343. 'Generally an absence of beard and whiskers.' Armstrong's Nar., p. 193. 'Beard is universally wanting.' Kotzebue's Voy., vol. i., p. 252. 'The young men have little beard, but some of the old ones have a tolerable shew of long gray hairs on the upper lip and chin.' Richardson's Pol. Reg., p. 303. 'All have beards.' Bell's Geography, vol. v., p. 294. Kirby affirms that in Alaska 'many of them have a profusion of whiskers and beard.' Smithsonian Report, 1864, p. 416.
22. 'The lip is perforated for the labret as the boy approaches manhood, and is considered an important era in his life.' Armstrong's Nar., p. 194. 'Some wore but one, others one on each side of the mouth.' Hooper's Tuski, p. 224. 'Lip ornaments, with the males, appear to correspond with the tattooing of the chins of the females.' Beechey's Voy., vol. i., p. 384.
23. 'The women tattoo their faces in blue lines produced by making stitches with a fine needle and thread, smeared with lampblack.' Richardson's Pol. Reg., p. 305. Between Kotzebue Sound and Icy Cape, 'all the women were tattooed upon the chin with three small lines.' They blacken 'the edges of the eyelids with plumbago, rubbed up with a little saliva upon a piece of slate.' Beechey's Voy., vol. i., p. 360. At Point Barrow, the women have on the chin 'a vertical line about half an inch broad in the centre, extending from the lip, with a parallel but narrower one on either side of it, a little apart. Some had two vertical lines protruding from either angle of the mouth; which is a mark of their high position in the tribe.' Armstrong's Nar., pp. 101, 149. On Bering Isle, men as well as women tattoo. 'Plusieurs hommes avaient le visage tatoué.' Choris, Voy. Pitt., pt. ii., p. 5.
24. 'Give a particularly disgusting look when the bones are taken out, as the saliva continually runs over the chin.' Kotzebue's Voy., vol. i., p. 227. At Camden, labrets were made of large blue beads, glued to pieces of ivory. None worn at Coppermine River. Simpson's Nar., pp. 119, 347. 'Many of them also transfix the septum of the nose with a dentalium shell or ivory needle.' Richardson's Nar., vol. i., p. 355.
25. 'These natives almost universally use a very unpleasant liquid for cleansing purposes. They tan and soften the seal-skin used for boot-soles with it.' Whymper's Alaska, p. 161. 'Females occasionally wash their hair and faces with their own urine, the odour of which is agreeable to both sexes, and they are well accustomed to it, as this liquor is kept in tubs in the porches of their huts for use in dressing the deer and seal skins.' Richardson's Pol. Reg., p. 304. 'Show much skill in the preparation of whale, seal, and deer-skins.' Richardson's Nar., vol. i., p. 357. They have a great antipathy to water. 'Occasionally they wash their bodies with a certain animal fluid, but even this process is seldom gone through.' Seemann's Voy. Herald, vol. ii., p. 62.
26. 'During the summer, when on whaling or sealing excursions, a coat of the gut of the whale, and boots of seal or walrus hide, are used as water-proof coverings.' Seemann's Voy. Herald, vol. ii., p. 53. At Point Barrow they wear 'Kamleikas or water-proof shirts, made of the entrails of seals.' Simpson's Nar., p. 156. Women wear close-fitting breeches of seal-skin. Hooper's Tuski, p. 224. 'They are on the whole as good as the best oil-skins in England.' Beechey's Voy., vol. i., p. 340.
27. The dress of the two sexes is much alike, the outer shirt or jacket having a pointed skirt before and behind, those of the female being merely a little longer. 'Pretty much the same for both sexes.' Figuier's Human Race, p. 214.
28. 'They have besides this a jacket made of eider drakes' skins sewed together, which, put on underneath their other dress, is a tolerable protection against a distant arrow, and is worn in times of hostility.' Beechey's Voy., vol. i., p. 340. Messrs Dease and Simpson found those of Point Barrow 'well clothed in seal and reindeer skins.' Lond. Geog. Soc., Jour., vol. viii., p. 221. 'The finest dresses are made of the skins of unborn deer.' Richardson's Pol. Reg., p. 306. 'The half-developed skin of a fawn that has never lived, obtained by driving the doe till her offspring is prematurely born.' Whymper's Alaska, p. 160. Eskimo women pay much regard to their toilet. Richardson's Nar., vol. i., p. 355.
29. Their dress consists of two suits. Seemann's Voy. Herald, vol. ii., p. 52. 'Reindeer skin—the fur next the body.' Armstrong's Nar., p. 149. 'Two women, dressed like men, looked frightfully with their tattooed faces.' Kotzebue's Voy., vol. i., p. 191. Seal-skin jackets, bear-skin trowsers, and white-fox skin caps, is the male costume at Hudson Strait. The female dress is the same, with the addition of a hood for carrying children. Franklin's Nar., vol. i., p. 29. At Camden Bay, reindeer-skin jackets and water-proof boots. Simpson's Nar., p. 119. At Coppermine River, 'women's boots which are not stiffened out with whalebone, and the tails of their jackets are not over one foot long.' Hearne's Travels, p. 166. Deer-skin, hair outside, ornamented with white fur. Kirby, in Smithsonian Rept., 1864, p. 416. The indoor dress of the eastern Eskimo is of reindeer-skin, with the fur inside. 'When they go out, another entire suit with the fur outside is put over all, and a pair of watertight sealskin moccasins, with similar mittens for their hands.' Silliman's Journal, vol. xvi., p. 146. The frock at Coppermine River has a tail something like a dress-coat. Simpson's Nar., p. 350.
30. 'Some of them are even half-naked, as a summer heat, even of 10° is insupportable to them.' Kotzebue's Voy., vol. i., p. 205.