Thong

“ Jüthner has proved conclusively that the objects represented are boxing thongs. [697]
Very frequently, as in the vase with which we are dealing, we see one or both ends of the thong gathered into a loop. This arrangement is clearly connected with the method of fastening the thong. Philostratus, in describing the meilichai, says that the four fingers were inserted into a loop in such a way as to allow the hand to be clenched, and were held tight by a cord fastened round the forearm. [698] Cord and loop are merely parts of the leather thong. ”

“ Sometimes the latter made no resistance, but generally no sooner did it feel the touch of the thong than it broke away from the spot, and was only secured by the most strenuous exertions of its capturer. Every minute might be seen an unusually powerful rein furiously dragging a Lap round and round the inclosure, and occasionally it would fairly overcome the restraint of the thong, and whirl its antagonist prostrate on the sod. This part of the scene was highly exciting, and one could not but admire the great muscular strength and the trained skill evinced by all the Laps, women as well as men. ”

“ The total disappearance of the thong to the hunting-whip seems like carrying a good thing rather too far. A fox breaks probably under your horse’s nose: out comes the pack, none of the servants are at hand, and they run a field or two from the cover before any one stops them, or their own mettle allows them to turn: one crack of your whip would have saved all that. One thing you can do without your thong, but you should be very careful how you do it. ”

“ A deer skin is dampened, rolled up, and put up over the lamp for a day or two to remove the hair by sweating, and then cut into a single long piece of fine thong.
Fig. 302.—Double-slit splice for rawhide lines.
All the men do not appear able to do this fine work. For instance, our friend Mû ́ñialu had the babiche for his new snowshoes made by his house-mate, the younger Tuñazu. When it is desired to fasten together two pieces of the stouter kinds of thong, what I have so often referred to as the “double-slit splice” is generally employed. ”

“ From the adobe cabin squatting in the moonlight came the shrill, insistent jingling of a bell. The man looked that way thoughtfully, climbed down and went to the cabin, keeping carefully in the beaten trail.
The door was not locked. A rawhide thong tied it fast to a staple in the door jamb. With the bell shrilling its summons inside, the man paused long enough to study the knotting of the thong before he untied it and stepped inside. He went to the telephone slowly, thoughtfully, his cigarette held between two fingers, his forehead drawn down so that his eyebrows were pinched together. ”

“ Then the man, being bathed, is to be laid on his face along the board or bench, and a thong is to be twice passed round his breast by the armpits along the back; and the extremities of the thong are to be fastened to a pestle like a piece of wood erected on the floor at the extremity of the board or bench, and this to be given to a person standing behind the patient’s head to hold, so that when the lower parts are secured oppositely, and the upper pulled towards the head, extension may be made at the proper time. ”

“ It is nearly round, instead of elliptical, with an irregular knob at the butt, and not curved, but fastened obliquely to the head. The loop of double thong attached to the haft is probably to go round the wrist.
Fig. 25, No. 56639 [161] , from Utkiavwĭñ, is of pectolite, the upper and lower faces almost black and the sides light gray. The haft is of hard wood and unusually long (7.2 inches) . It is noticeable for being attached at right angles to the head, by a very stout lashing of thong of the usual kind, and further tightened by a short flat stick wedged in below the head on one side. ”

“ Like most discoveries and inventions that have advanced the human race, his were, in the main, accidental; yet he could now reason from the accidental to the analogous. Idly swinging his girdle around his head, one day, and letting go, he was surprised at the distance to which, with little effort, he could send the stone-laden pouch. Months of puzzled experimenting produced a sling—at first with a thong of hide fast to each stone, later with the double thong and pouch that small boys and savages have not yet improved upon. ”

“ I had not from the first struggled, for I felt sure that I should thus tighten the thongs which bound me. Now, however, I set to work calmly to try and release myself, by drawing up one of my hands, hoping that if I could but get my head low enough to reach the thong round my arm, I might in time gnaw it through ”

“ Not until you are proficient enough to catch the thong with certainty should you attempt to drive either four-in-hand or tandem, and you will find, the moment that you take the reins in your hands and start to drive, that it will be far more difficult to catch the thong than when you could give it your undivided attention. Moreover, it is vastly more difficult to catch the thong in a wind, or under trees or other obstacles, than when learning in the stable, and constant practice is required to keep one’s hand in. ”

“ Should the latter be the case, if the driver lower his crop, the thong will almost always get released; but should it not, he must let the thong loose, and draw it out from the point. When it comes up from the tail, let the coachman throw back his crop a little to his right hand, and the point of the thong will fall across his fingers, when he catches it, and puts it back into his hand. It must be observed, that, in striking the near wheel horse, the wrist only, as in sword exercise, is at work: the body must be quite at rest ”

“ At the given signal the executioner advances, his body bent, and dragging the long lash between his legs. When he has arrived within three or four paces of his victim, he suddenly raises the knout above his head: the thong flies into the air, whistles, descends and clasps the naked torso of the sufferer as with a circle of iron. ”

“ There are two main forms of these—the Lap thong and the Huitfeldt. The Lap thong is merely a long strap of raw hide or leather. A loop is drawn through the hole under the toe iron, the long end is taken round the heel and through the loop, then back round the heel and through a slit in the other or short end. ”

“ The thong is without handles; it is used to tie the parts together when they are not in 562 use. A bunch of willow twigs, the down of which is used as tinder, is also shown (fig. 31) .
This set is especially interesting, because it shows the degeneration of an art. ”

“ And when no game is found [19] , all the hunting apparatus should be entirely taken away.
The accoutrements of the dogs consist in a [20] collar, a leather leading thong, and a surcingle to guard the body. The collar should be soft and broad that it may not rub off the dogs hair; the leading thong should have a knot for the hand to hold by, and nothing more; neither do those lead their dogs well who make part of the thong serve for a collar; the surcingle should have broad thongs that they may not gall the belly of the dog [21] , and sharp points are sewed on it to preserve the breed. ”

“ Seizing one of the thongs she disengaged it easily and quickly from the girdle that supported them about her hips, and grasping the end of the thong between a thumb and forefinger she whirled it rapidly in a vertical plane until the feathered pebble at its end was moving with great rapidity—then she let go the thong. ”

“ Before a coachman hits a wheel-horse, he should twist his thong three times round the crop of his whip, holding the crop at that moment somewhat horizontally, by which means the thong will twist towards the thin end of the crop, when the thong, being doubled, will not exceed the length of a pair-horse thong, and in some measure resemble it. Being double renders it of course more severe, as it falls more heavily on the horse ”

“ The point of the thong is more secure in your right hand if it is wrapped a couple of times around the handle, though there is high authority against this practice, on the ground that it is not so easy to unwind your thong when wanted. ”

“ Thus prepared, the hunters ride at a herd of cattle, and when arrived within a certain distance of a beast, they throw their thong at him with such exactness, that they never fail to fix the noose about his horns. Finding himself thus entangled, the beast usually endeavours to run away, but the hunter attends his motions, and the horse being swifter, the thong is prevented from being so much straitened as to break, till another hunter throws another noose about one of his hind-legs. ”

“ But the most curious precaution to the same effect consists in tying his own knees together with a thong, so securely as to prevent any rustling of his clothes, which might otherwise alarm the animal. In this situation a man will sit quietly sometimes for hours together, attentively listening to any noise made by the seal, and sometimes using the keip-kuttuk, an instrument hereafter described, in order to ascertain whether the animal is still at work below. ”

“ In using your whip, make as little fuss and noise as possible; each horse should be hit so that the other three hear nothing and know nothing. Do not flick a horse, but hit and draw the thong at the same time, then it means something. In putting up your thong, do not make a flourish with the arm. It is just as easy to put the thong up with the right elbow at the side.
The wheelers should be hit in front of the pad, down the shoulder; it is better to hit the off wheeler on the off shoulder if his mate is restive.
If there is kicking, the best punishment is a cut over the ears. ”

“ Then another man bent down and drove his knife through the tail of each, just above the rattles. Through the wound he passed a thong of buckskin and looped it on the under side. Then, in each case, the other end of the thong was fastened securely to a stake, driven into the ground. When the work was done, a distance of ten yards separated the two stakes, and before each was a twisting reptile, wild with rage and pain. A man stood in front at a safe distance and held out a stick, teasingly. The snake flung itself to its full length, and the distance it could reach was carefully measured. ”

“ Even when the tails are sold to Europeans, an absurdly high price is asked for them. One of these arm-tufts is now before me. The skin has been stripped from the tail, leaving a thong of eighteen inches in length above the tuft of hair. This thong has then been cut into three strips of half an inch in width, and the strips have been rolled up spirally, as already described. As the slit is carried to the very end of the tail, the tuft is spread open, and therefore looks twice as large as would have been the case had it been left untouched. ”

“ And, look! the poor wretch’s arms are fastened by a thong to his sides. What brutes! Hand us the knife, Nick, and I’ll cut them. How tough they are!”
It needed a strong hand and a sharp blade to sever the stout thongs, which on subsequent examination were found to consist of rhinoceros hide. ”

“ I never had this happen to me, but fancy it is little to be dreaded if the coachman will not loose his thong, but keep it caught up ready to administer a good dose of double thong over the horse's face as soon as he comes within reach. If worst comes to worst, however, a two-wheeled conveyance is able to turn on its own ground, and follow the horses, even if it is in the wrong direction. ”

“ They do this work quite rapidly and with great skill, cutting single lines upward of 90 feet long and only one-eighth inch in diameter, almost perfectly even. These fine lines of seal-skin thong, which serve a great variety of purposes, are usually made when they are in the summer camps, before the breaking up of the ice. They are dried by stretching them between stakes 6 inches or a foot high, driven into the ground. ”

“ The part of the thong next the handle is platted a little way down to stiffen it and give it a spring, on which much of its use depends; and that which composes the lash is chewed, by the women to make it flexible in frosty weather. The men acquire from their youth considerable expertness in the use of this whip, the lash of which is left to trail along the ground by the side of the sledge, and with which they can inflict a very severe blow on any dog at pleasure. ”

“ If only a few men go out hunting and famine is impending, he sometimes waits for a whole day or even longer, though it be cold and the wind rage over the icy fields. He builds up a semicircular wall of snow blocks to keep off the piercing wind and makes a seat in the center of it. A skin is spread under his feet and his legs are tied together with a thong, which is fastened by a peculiar kind of buckle (tutareang) with two holes (Fig. 398) . One end of the thong is firmly tied to the buckle, passing through one of the holes, while the opposite end passes tightly through the second hole. ”

“ They discover transgressions of taboos and other causes of ill luck. One of the most curious methods of divination applied by the angakut is that of ‘head-lifting.’ A thong is placed around the head of a person who lies down next to the patient. ”

“ And when she took it out, it was so small that it did not look like a dress at all, but it was very pretty. And he ordered her then to dip it in the water bucket. When it was wet, he was able to put it on, and when the lacing thong at the bottom touched the wound, it was healed. ”

“ Miserly in disposition, few outward ornaments grace his person, save an occasional necklace of fat, and a few armlets and bracelets composed of potent passages from the Korán either stitched in leather, or enveloped in coloured thread. A thong adorned with a metal button girds to the right hip of old and young a creese two feet in length, the wooden hilt of which is decorated with a pewter stud, whilst the scabbard is ornamented with an aromatic sprig, employed as a tooth-brush, and masticated for hours together. ”