This wood is sufficiently abundant to furnish the natives with all they need for fuel and other purposes, and consists chiefly of pine, spruce, and cottonwood, mostly in the form of water-worn logs, often of large size. Of late years, also, much wood of the different kinds used in shipbuilding has drifted ashore from wrecks. [Footnote N92: “The oil had acted as a manure on the soil, and produced a luxuriant crop of grass from 1 to 2 feet high” (village at Point Atkinson, east of the Mackenzie). Richardson Searching Exp., vol. 1, p. 254.] MINERALS. The people of this region are acquainted with few mineral substances, excluding the metals which they obtain from the whites. The most important are flint, slate, soapstone, jade, and a peculiar form of massive pectolite, first described by Prof. F. W. Clarke[N93] from specimens brought home by our party. Flint, ánma, was formerly in great demand for arrow and spear heads and other implements, and according to Dr. Simpson[N94] was obtained from the Nunatañmiun. It is generally black or a slightly translucent gray, but we collected a number of arrowheads, etc., made of jasper, red or variegated. A few crystals of transparent quartz, sometimes smoky, were also seen, and appeared to be used as amulets. Slate, ulu´ksɐ, “material for a round knife,” was used, as its name imports, for making the woman’s round knife, and for harpoon blades, etc. It is a smooth clay slate, varying in hardness, and light green, red, purple, dark gray, or black in color. All the pieces of soft gray soapstone, tună´ktɐ, which are so common at both villages, are probably fragments of the lamps and kettles obtained in former years from the eastern natives. The jade is often very beautiful, varying from a pale or bright translucent green to a dark olive, almost black, and was formerly used for making adzes, whetstones, and occasionally other implements. The pectolite, generally of a pale greenish or bluish color, was only found in the form of oblong, more or less cylindrical masses, used as hammerheads. Both of these minerals were called kau´dlo, and were said to come “from the east, a long way off,” from high rocky ground, but all that we could learn was very indefinite. Dr. Simpson was informed[N95] that the stones for making whetstones were brought from the Kuwûk River, so that this jade is probably the same as that which is said to form Jade Mountain, in that region. [Footnote N93: U.S. Geol. Surv., Bull. 9, p. 9, 1884.] [Footnote N94: Op. cit., p. 266.] [Footnote N95: Op. cit., p. 266.]