Finer lines, such as those used for fishing or for winding whip-stocks, and thread for sewing purposes, are manufactured from reindeer sinew. The best is that obtained from along the spine, which is always saved from the carcase. It is prepared for use by first drying and then rubbing till it becomes quite soft, when it is readily frayed out into fine fibres, in which condition it is used for fine needle-work; but when coarser thread or stout cord is required, these individual fibres are plaited together, with wonderful neatness and rapidity. One woman can make fifty or sixty yards of this cord or thread in a day.
With the Eskimos all joints, of whatever kind, are secured by these thongs, they having no nails or screws to supply their place. In making a komitick, the cross slats are all secured to the runners by seal thongs. In framing a kyack the numerous pieces are lashed together, usually with seal or deer-skin, though sometimes, and preferably, with whalebone.
ESKIMO KYACK.
The Eskimo kyack or canoe consists of a light frame neatly made from all sorts of scrap-wood, and strongly jointed together in the way just described. The frame having been completed, it is then covered with green skins, either of seal or deer, dressed, with the hair removed. The skins are joined to each other as they are put on by double water-tight seams, and are drawn tightly over the frame, so that when they dry they become very hard and as tight as a drum-head.
A full-sized kyack thus made is about twenty-two feet long, a foot and a half wide, and a foot deep. It is completely covered over on the top, excepting the small hole where the paddler sits, so that though an extremely cranky craft in the hands of a novice, it is used in perfect safety, even in very rough water, by an expert. Indeed the Eskimos have an arrangement by which they can travel while almost submerged in the water. They have a thin waterproof parchment coat which they pull on over their heads in rough weather. This they place on the outside of the rim at the opening of the kyack, and tie securely, so that if the boat were to turn upside down the water could not rush in.
An Eskimo in his kyack can travel much faster than two men can paddle an ordinary canoe. I have known them to make six miles an hour in dead water, whereas four miles would be good going for a canoe.
ESKIMO OOMIACK.
The “oomiack,” or woman’s boat, is a flat-bottomed affair of large carrying capacity. Like the kyack it is a skin-covered frame, the many pieces of which are lashed together with thongs of skin or whalebone; but instead of being covered on top it is open, and is of a much broader model, and not so sharp at the ends. It is chiefly used by the women for moving camp from place to place, but is never used in the hunt. It is essentially a freighting craft, whereas the kyack is used only for hunting or speedy travel. Oomiacks are often made large enough to carry thirty or forty people. They are propelled by ordinary paddles, not by the long double-bladed ones used with the kyacks.