DOMESTIC TROUBLES OF KEKEKOOARSIS. 85 



marketable property wherewitli to buy clothes and 

 luxuries at the Forts. These Indians, as indeed all 

 others we met with, managed their families admirably. 

 An Indian child is seldom heard to cry, and matri- 

 monial squabbles seem unknown. Our friend Keena- 

 montiayoo was a most affectionate husband and father, 

 and his wife and children obeyed him at a word, 

 evidently looking up to him as a superior being, to be 

 loved with respect. 



Amons: the thingrs which struck us when we be- 

 came more extensively acquainted with the Indians, 

 was the absence of deformity and baldness, or grey 

 hair, amongst them. The former may no doubt be 

 accounted for by the influence of " natural selection," 

 and perhaps the careful setting of the infants' limbs in 

 the " moss-bag," or Indian cradle. This is a board 

 with two side flaps of cloth, which lace together up 

 the centre. The child is laid on its back on the board, 

 packed with soft moss, and laced firmly down, with its 

 arms to its side, and only its head at liberty. The 

 cradle is slung on the back of the mother when travel- 

 ling, or reared against a tree when resting in camp, the 

 child being only occasionally released from its bondage 

 for a few moments. The little prisoners are remarkably 

 good ; no squalling distui'bs an Indian camp, and 

 strict obedience is obtained without recourse to cor- 

 poreal punishment. 



On one occasion Kekekooarsis arrived in a state of 

 great excitement from domestic troubles. He had sold 

 one of his daughters in marriage — after the Indian 

 fashion — for a horse, but his ungrateful son-in-law, 



