Fig. 543. (S. 1–2.)
Fig. 544. (S. 1–3.) Elk-horn spoons, from Humboldt County, California. H. K. Deisher’s collection.
It is not difficult to explain the preponderance of harpoons in the North and the scarcity of them in the South. They are essentially a cold-climate implement. In the St. Lawrence region, where they abound, nets and traps cannot be used save during summer and fall. The winter sets in early, and the spring is late. While fish were harpooned when on the spawning-beds, yet most of the harpooning was done in the winter. Even to this late date the Ojibwa Indians spear great quantities of fish in the winter season. Pickerel, pike, muscalonge are attracted by a moving bait. The Indian cuts a hole through the ice, and erects a small structure to shield himself from the wind. An effigy of a fish made of wood or bone, or in these modern times of tin, is dangled about four or five feet beneath the ice. Large fish approach this decoy, and as they are more sluggish in their movements in the winter, the Indian has no difficulty in driving the spear into such one as he wishes, before it is able to draw out of range. I suppose that the method did not vary in ancient times. Naturally, where possible, the Indians preferred to set nets or build fish-weirs. But practically all the nets and weirs of ancient times have long since disappeared.
Fig. 545. (S. 3–4.) This is a long spoon, badly decayed, but sufficiently preserved for us to determine its character. It is about six inches in length. It was found under an old building in Salem, Massachusetts, and is in the Peabody Museum. Very few bone or horn spoons, ladles, and dishes of the Indians remain, and yet we know that a great many were made and used by primitive man in the United States.
Fig. 541 illustrates a large, strong harpoon of bone. This spear has several prominent barbs. The muscalonge and sturgeon of the far North were large, strong fish and required a heavy spear to hold them. Whether the Indians of the Lake Superior region in ancient times made use of the spear with a detachable point, to which was attached a cord and float, I am unable to state. Possibly they made use of devices of that sort.
In the East and the North the harder and heavier bones, such as the horns of elk, deer, and moose, were made use of as gouges, celts, and scrapers. Numbers of these have been found at Madisonville cemetery, in the Little Miami Valley, ten miles north of Cincinnati, and also in the Iroquois sites along the Mohawk River in western New York. Mr. David Boyle, Curator of the Provincial Museum, Toronto, presents descriptions of a number of horn implements in his publications.[[22]]
Bones were made use of as spoons, and ladles. Numerous examples of these are not wanting in the museums. The longer, slender bones were ground and polished and pointed, and may have served as hairpins and cloak-fasteners. A splendid example of what we have considered bone hairpins was taken from the ashes in Kelley Cavern, Arkansas. This bone was found at a depth of five feet, and is nine inches long.
