This is hollow and filled with any sphagnum moss. One end is permanently closed by a wooden or ivory plug, held in by little pegs. The plug in the other end is easily taken out. The needle case is usually pierced to receive a loop by which it may be hung to the belt or the workbag.
[Illustration: FIG. 72.--Ivory needle case. Koksoagmyut.]
[Illustration: FIG. 73.--Ivory needle case. Koksoagmyut.]
Needles are also kept in a kind of small cushion (Fig. 74) made of sealskin, elaborately ornamented with beads and stuffed with sphagnum moss. The cushion is perforated around the edge to receive the needles, which would not easily go through the tough skin.
[Illustration: FIG. 74.--Sealskin needle cushion, with thimble. Koksoagmyut.]
Accompanying one of these needle cushions in the collection is one of the old-fashioned thimbles such as are still used, although metal thimbles are preferred. It is simply a strip of sealskin sewed into a ring large enough to fit the forefinger, and is usually attached to the needle cushion by a thong with an ivory toggle on the end, to prevent the thimble from slipping off.
Small articles used in sewing, such as scraps of skin, needle cases, sinew thread, thimbles, etc., are carried in small bags of deerskin, which are often elaborately ornamented with beads of various colors, like the specimen in the collection, No. 3047.
Notwithstanding the fact that these people have had their lot cast upon the frozen shores of the sea, they appear happy and contented and loath to leave the land of their birth. Although it is a constant struggle amidst the terrible storms of a region where for eight months in the year the soil is frozen and the few warm days of summer bring forth a scanty vegetation, yet so strong is their love for these inhospitable shores that the absent pine for a return and soon lose their hold on life if they are not able to do so.
During the intervals between the hunts and when food is still plentiful, the Eskimo, divert themselves with games of various kinds of their own. They are also quick to adopt other games which require outdoor exercise.
Football calls out everybody, from the aged and bent mother of a numerous family to the toddling youngster scarcely able to do more than waddle under the burden of his heavy deerskin clothes. Wrestling among the men is indulged in for hours at a time. The opponents remove all their superfluous garments, seize each other around the waist and lock hands behind each other's backs. The feet are spread widely apart and each endeavors to draw, by the strength of the arms alone, the back of his opponent into a curve and thus bring him off his feet. Then with a lift he is quickly thrown flat on his back. The fall must be such that the head touches the ground. Where the contestants are nearly matched the struggle may continue so long that one of them gives up from exhaustion. The feet are never used for tripping. Such a procedure would soon cause the witnesses to stop the struggle.