The physical characteristics of the Eskimos are: a fair complexion, the skin, when free from dirt and paint, being almost white;[15] a medium stature, well proportioned, thick-set, muscular, robust, active,[16] with small and beautifully shaped hands and feet;[17] a pyramidal head;[18] a broad egg-shaped face; high rounded cheek-bones; flat nose; small oblique eyes; large mouth; teeth regular, but well worn;[19] coarse black hair, closely cut upon the crown, leaving a monk-like ring around the edge,[20] and a paucity of beard.[21] The men frequently leave the hair in a natural state. The women of Icy Reef introduce false hair among their own, wearing the whole in two immense bows at the back of the head. At Point Barrow, they separate the hair into two parts or braids, saturating it with train-oil, and binding it into stiff bunches with strips of skin. Their lower extremities are short, so that in a sitting posture they look taller than when standing.
IMPROVEMENTS UPON NATURE.
Were these people satisfied with what nature has done for them, they would be passably good-looking. But with them as with all mankind, no matter how high the degree of intelligence and refinement attained, art must be applied to improve upon nature. The few finishing touches neglected by the Creator, man is ever ready to supply.
Arrived at the age of puberty, the great work of improvement begins. Up to this time the skin has been kept saturated in grease and filth, until the natural color is lost, and until the complexion is brought down to the Eskimo standard. Now pigments of various dye are applied, both painted outwardly and pricked into the skin; holes are cut in the face, and plugs or labrets inserted. These operations, however, attended with no little solemnity, are supposed to possess some significance other than that of mere ornament. Upon the occasion of piercing the lip, for instance, a religious feast is given.
On the northern coast the women paint the eyebrows and tattoo the chin; while the men only pierce the lower lip under one or both corners of the mouth, and insert in each aperture a double-headed sleeve-button or dumb-bell-shaped labret, of bone, ivory, shell, stone, glass, or wood. The incision when first made is about the size of a quill, but as the aspirant for improved beauty grows older, the size of the orifice is enlarged until it reaches a width of half or three quarters of an inch.[22] In tattooing, the color is applied by drawing a thread under the skin, or pricking it in with a needle. Different tribes, and different ranks of the same tribe, have each their peculiar form of tattooing. The plebeian female of certain bands is permitted to adorn her chin with but one vertical line in the centre, and one parallel to it on either side, while the more fortunate noblesse mark two vertical lines from each corner of the mouth.[23] A feminine cast of features, as is common with other branches of the Mongolian race, prevails in both sexes. Some travelers discover in the faces of the men a characteristic expression of ferociousness, and in those of the women, an extraordinary display of wantonness. A thick coating of filth and a strong odor of train-oil are inseparable from an Eskimo, and the fashion of labrets adds in no wise to his comeliness.[24]
ESKIMO DRESS.
For covering to the body, the Eskimos employ the skin of all the beasts and birds that come within their reach. Skins are prepared in the fur,[25] and cut and sewed with neatness and skill. Even the intestines of seals and whales are used in the manufacture of water-proof overdresses.[26] The costume for both sexes consists of long stockings or drawers, over which are breeches extending from the shoulders to below the knees; and a frock or jacket, somewhat shorter than the breeches with sleeves and hood. This garment is made whole, there being no openings except for the head and arms. The frock of the male is cut at the bottom nearly square, while that of the female reaches a little lower, and terminates before and behind in a point or scollop. The tail of some animal graces the hinder part of the male frock; the woman's has a large hood, in which she carries her infant. Otherwise both sexes dress alike; and as, when stripped of their facial decorations, their physiognomies are alike, they are not unfrequently mistaken one for the other.[27] They have boots of walrus or seal skin, mittens or gloves of deer-skin, and intestine water-proofs covering the entire body. Several kinds of fur frequently enter into the composition of one garment. Thus the body of the frock, generally of reindeer-skin, may be of bird, bear, seal, mink, or squirrel skin; while the hood may be of fox-skin, the lining of hare-skin, the fringe of wolverine-skin, and the gloves of fawn-skin.[28] Two suits are worn during the coldest weather; the inner one with the fur next the skin, the outer suit with the fur outward.[29] Thus, with their stomachs well filled with fat, and their backs covered with furs, they bid defiance to the severest Arctic winter.[30]
DWELLINGS OF THE ESKIMOS.
In architecture, the Eskimo is fully equal to the emergency; building, upon a soil which yields him little or no material, three classes of dwellings. Penetrating the frozen earth, or casting around him a frozen wall, he compels the very elements from which he seeks protection to protect him. For his yourt or winter residence he digs a hole of the required dimensions, to a depth of about six feet.[31] Within this excavation he erects a frame, either of wood or whalebone, lashing his timbers with thongs instead of nailing them. This frame is carried upward to a distance of two or three feet above the ground,[32] when it is covered by a dome-shaped roof of poles or whale-ribs turfed and earthed over.[33] In the centre of the roof is left a hole for the admission of light and the emission of smoke. In absence of fire, a translucent covering of whale-intestine confines the warmth of putrifying filth, and completes the Eskimo's sense of comfort. To gain admittance to this snug retreat, without exposing the inmates to the storms without, another and a smaller hole is dug to the same depth, a short distance from the first. From one to the other, an underground passage-way is then opened, through which entrance is made on hands and knees. The occupants descend by means of a ladder, and over the entrance a shed is erected, to protect it from the snow.[34] Within the entrance is hung a deer-skin door, and anterooms are arranged in which to deposit frozen outer garments before entering the heated room. Around the sides of the dwelling, sleeping-places are marked out; for bedsteads, boards are placed upon logs one or two feet in diameter, and covered with willow branches and skins. A little heap of stones in the centre of the room, under the smoke-hole, forms the fireplace. In the corners of the room are stone lamps, which answer all domestic purposes in the absence of fire-wood.[35] In the better class of buildings, the sides and floor are boarded. Supplies are kept in a store house at a little distance from the dwelling, perched upon four posts, away from the reach of the dogs, and a frame is always erected on which to hang furs and fish. Several years are sometimes occupied in building a hut.[36]
Mark how nature supplies this treeless coast with wood. The breaking-up of winter in the mountains of Alaska is indeed a breaking-up. The accumulated masses of ice and snow, when suddenly loosened by the incessant rays of the never-setting sun, bear away all before them. Down from the mountain-sides comes the avalanche, uprooting trees, swelling rivers, hurrying with its burden to the sea. There, casting itself into the warm ocean current, the ice soon disappears, and the driftwood which accompanied it is carried northward and thrown back upon the beach by the October winds. Thus huge forest-trees, taken up bodily, as it were, in the middle of a continent, and carried by the currents to the incredible distance, sometimes, of three thousand miles, are deposited all along the Arctic seaboard, laid at the very door of these people, a people whose store of this world's benefits is none of the most abundant.[37] True, wood is not an absolute necessity with them, as many of their houses in the coldest weather have no fire; only oil-lamps being used for cooking and heating. Whale-ribs supply the place of trees for house and boat timbers, and hides are commonly used for boards. Yet a bountiful supply of wood during their long, cold, dark winter comes in no wise amiss.[38] Their summer tents are made of seal or untanned deer skins with the hair outward, conical or bell-shaped, and without a smoke-hole as no fires are ever kindled within them. The wet or frozen earth is covered with a few coarse skins for a floor.[39]