[STYLE OF DRESS.]
Dr. Simpson[206] gave an excellent general description of the dress of these people, which is the same at the present day. While the same in general pattern as that worn by all other Eskimo, it differs in many details from that worn by the eastern Eskimo,[207] and most closely resembles the style in vogue at and near Norton Sound.[208] The man’s dress (Fig. 51, from a photograph of Apaidyao) consists of the usual loose hooded frock, without opening except at the neck and wrists. This reaches just over the hips, rarely about to mid-thigh, where it is cut off square, and is usually confined by a girdle at the waist. Under this garment is worn a similar one, usually of lighter skin and sometimes without a hood. The thighs are clad in one or two pairs of tight-fitting knee breeches, confined round the hips by a girdle and usually secured by a drawstring below the knee which ties over the tops of the boots. On the legs and feet are worn, first, a pair of long, deerskin stockings with the hair inside; then slippers of tanned sealskin, in the bottom of which is spread a layer of whalebone shavings, and outside a pair of close-fitting boots, held in place by a string round the ankle, usually reaching above the knee and ending with a rough edge, which is covered by the breeches. Dress boots often end with an ornamental border and a drawstring just below the knee. The boots are of reindeer skin, with white sealskin soles for winter and dry weather, but in summer waterproof boots of black sealskin with soles of white whale skin, etc., are worn. Overshoes of the same material, reaching just above the ankles, with a drawstring at the top and ankle strings, are sometimes worn over the winter boots. When traveling on snowshoes or in soft dry snow the boots are replaced by stockings of the same shape as the under ones, but made of very thick winter deerskins with the flesh side out.
Instead of breeches and boots a man occasionally wears a pair of pantaloons or tight-fitting trousers terminating in shoes such as are worn by the women. Over the usual dress is worn in very cold weather a circular mantle of deerskin, fastened by a thong at the neck—such mantles are nowadays occasionally made of blankets—and in rainy weather both sexes wear the hooded rain frock of seal gut. Of late years both sexes have adopted the habit of wearing over their clothes a loose hoodless frock of cotton cloth, usually bright-colored calico, especially in blustering weather, when it is useful in keeping the drifting snow out of their furs.
Both men and women wear gloves or mittens. These are of deerskin for ordinary use, but in extreme weather mittens of polar bear skin are worn. When hunting in winter it is the custom to wear gloves of thin deerskin under the bearskin mitten, so that the rifle can be handled without touching the bare hand to the cold iron. The women have a common trick of wearing only one mitten, but keeping the other arm withdrawn from the sleeve and inside of the jacket.
Fig. 52.—Woman’s hood.
The dress of the women consists of two frocks, which differ from those of the men in being continued from the waist in two rather full rounded skirts at the front and back, reaching to or below the knee. A woman’s frock is always distinguished by a sort of rounded bulge or pocket at the nape of the neck (see Fig. 52, from a sketch by the writer), which is intended to receive the head of the infant when carried in the jacket. The little peak at the top of the hood is also characteristic of the woman’s frock. On her legs a woman wears a pair of tight-fitting deerskin pantaloons with the hair next the skin, and outside of these a similar pair made of the skins of deer legs, with the hair out, and having soles of sealskin, but no anklestrings. The outer pantaloons are usually laid aside in spring, and waterproof boots like the men’s, but fastened below the knee with drawstrings, are worn over the under pantaloons. In the summer pantaloons wholly of waterproof sealskin are often put on. The women’s pantaloons, like the men’s breeches, are fastened with a girdle just above the hips. It appears that they do not stay up very well, as the women are continually “hitching” them up and tightening their girdles.
Until they reach manhood the boys wear pantaloons like the women, but their jackets are cut just like those of the men. The dress of the girls is a complete miniature of that of the women, even to the pocket for the child’s head. Those who are well-to-do generally own several complete suits of clothes, and present a neat appearance when not engaged in dirty work. The poorer ones wear one suit on all occasions till it becomes shabby. New clothes are seldom put on till winter.
The outer frock is not often worn in the iglu, being usually taken off before entering the room, and the under one is generally dispensed with. Men habitually leave off their boots in the house, and rarely their stockings and breeches, retaining only a pair of thin deerskin drawers. This custom of stripping in the house has been noticed among all Eskimos whose habits have been described, from Greenland to Siberia. The natives are slow to adopt any modifications in the style of dress, the excellence and convenience of which has been so frequently commented upon that it is unnecessary to refer to it. One or two youths learned from association with us the convenience of pockets, and accordingly had “patch pockets” of cloth sewed on the outside of the skirt of the inner frock, and one young man in 1883 wore a pair of sealskin hip boots, evidently copies from our india-rubber wading boots. I now proceed to the description of the clothing in detail.