Why the development of the harpoon was arrested at this particular stage is not so easily determined. A natural supposition would be that this was the form of harpoon used by their ancestors when they first began to be successful whalemen. That they connect the idea of good luck with these ancient stone harpoons is shown by what occurred at Point Barrow in 1883. Of late years they have obtained from the ships many ordinary “whale-irons,” and some people at least had got into the habit of using them. Now, the bad luck of the season of 1882, when the boats of both villages together caught only one small whale, was attributed to the use of these “irons,” and it was decided by the elders that the _first_ harpoon struck into the whale must be a stone-bladed one such as their forefathers used when they killed many whales. In this connection, it is interesting to note a parallel custom observed at Point Hope. Hooper[N338] says that at this place the beluga must always be struck with a _flint_ spear, even if it has been killed by a rifle shot. [Footnote N338: Corwin Report, p. 41.] [Illustration: FIG. 238.--Whale lance.] _Lances._--As I have said on a preceding page, some of the natives now use bomb-guns for dispatching the harpooned whale, and all the whaleboats are provided with steel whale lances obtained from the ships. In former times they used a large and powerful lance with a broad flint head. They seem to have continued the use of this weapon, probably for the same reasons that led them to retain the ancient harpoon for whaling until they obtained their present supply of steel lances, as we found no signs of iron whale lances of native manufacture, such as are found in Greenland and elsewhere. We obtained nine heads for stone lances (kaluwiɐ) and one complete lance, a very fine specimen (No. 56765 [537], Fig. 238), which was brought down as a present from Nuwŭk. The broad, sharp head is of light gray flint, mounted on a shaft of spruce 12 feet 6 inches long. It has a broad, stout tang inserted in the cleft end of the shaft. The shaft is rhomboidal in section with rounded edges, and tapers from a breadth of 2 inches and a thickness of 1 at the tip to a butt of 0.7 inch broad and 1 thick. The tip of the shaft has a whipping of sinew-braid 1¾ inches deep, “kackled” down on both edges, one end of the twine on each edge, so that the hitch made by one end crosses the round turn of the other, making in all twenty-six turns. The shaft has been painted red for 1½ inches below the whipping. [Illustration: FIG. 239.--Flint head of whale lance. 1/2] [Illustration: FIG. 240.--Flint heads for whale lances.]