[6] See bibliography. _The Kayak_ The Eskimo hunting boat, the kayak, is more widely employed in the Arctic than the umiak, and its variations in model, construction, and appearance are more distinct and numerous. The kayak is a long, usually narrow, decked canoe and is commonly very well finished. In Alaska a few undecked skin-covered canoes, used in rivers, are built on kayak proportions, but the model of these is quite different from that of the Alaskan sea-kayaks; the river canoes are ~V~ or flat bottomed, much like the Greenland kayaks. A similar kayak-type canoe, flat bottomed but birch-bark covered, is used by the Yukon Indians. Undoubtedly a number of such types once existed but most of these became extinct before any attempt was made to preserve models or canoes in museums. Few Eskimo tribes are without kayaks, only those living inland or where the sea is rarely open are unacquainted with these hunting craft. In very recent times some tribes have ceased to use kayaks, employing purchased canoes instead. The kayaks of the Asiatic Eskimos, and those from the Mackenzie to Hudson Bay, are now crudely built and of inferior design. Both the Greenland and the Alaskan kayaks are highly developed. The Greenland kayaks are undoubtedly given more intricate equipment in the way of weapons and accessories than the Alaskan craft, but it would be difficult to decide which is superior in construction and design. [Illustration: Figure 174 FRAME OF KAYAK, Nunivak Island, Alaska, with young owner beneath. (_Photo by Henry B. Collins._)] The basic models used in Eskimo kayaks are the multi-chine, the ~V~-bottom and the flat bottom. The multi-chine models, except for the river kayak-canoe just mentioned, which probably should be classed as a true open canoe rather than a kayak, are employed throughout Alaskan waters. The geographic boundaries of each basic hull form are rather ill-defined. The multi-chine kayak appears as far eastward as the northwest coast of Hudson's Bay. In this area, however, a ~V~-bottom kayak, now extinct, seems to have been in use on Southampton Island. A flat-bottom kayak, with the chines snied off much like a Japanese sampan, is in use in Hudson Strait, along the shores of Baffin Island and Labrador; a flat-bottom kayak shaped like a sharpie is used on the northwest coast of northern Greenland; and a ~V~-bottom hull is employed on the eastern, southwest, and south coasts of Greenland.