CRUISE AMONG HAIDA AND T LIN GIT VILLAGES. 171 



living on raw fish and birds. But in after years the great cave 

 became the burial ground of Kiooste. 



We were now obliged to return to Masset for provisions. Leav- 

 ing Masset at half past ten in the morning, we entered the harbor of 

 Old Tongas at half past nine the same night, having made eighty 

 miles in eleven hours. 



We were now in the country of the Tlingits, and before us was 

 Old Tongas — old because it was long since abandoned, and its in- 

 habitants had formed another or New Tongas. Tongas is the south- 

 ernmost of a chain of Tlingit villages which extends as far north 

 as the Aleutian Islands. Like the Haidas, the Tlingits are slowly 

 but surely disappearing, and the time must soon come wdien the race 

 will be entirely extinct. 



There is but little of interest to-day in Old Tongas except the 

 totem poles and the old ruined houses. Totems with the Tlingits 

 play the same important part in their civil and religious life that they 

 do among the Haidas. Even the corner posts of their houses are 

 carved into totemic designs. Comparing their totem poles and 

 memorial columns with those which we saw in the Haida villages, 

 it becomes apparent at once that the symbols are more boldly exe- 

 cuted and the conventionalism less pronounced. The figures are 

 not blended and combined as they are among the Haidas. We 

 noticed also that the human figure is repeated over and over again, 

 and is always portrayed with a boldness and fidelity that are worthy 

 of the highest praise. 



One of the unique features of Old Tongas, and one we saw no- 

 where else, was the ruin of a house which still retained its old front 

 porch made up of heavy logs; while in front, leading up to the 

 porch, was a pair of primitive steps hewn out of a solid log. In an- 

 other place, almost entirely obscured by vegetation, we came upon a 

 recent house grave surmounted by a cross, showing that the influ- 

 ence of missionaries had been felt here before the town was deserted. 



At ten o'clock we started toward the east again. We had been 

 disappointed in not finding the grave of a Shaman or medicine man. 

 It is no easy matter to secure osteological material from the Tlingits, 

 for until within a very few years the dead were cremated. This 

 rule, however, did not apply to the Shamans, for it was believed that 

 their bodies would not burn, and consequently they were placed in 

 little house graves usually erected upon -some lonely rock or pic- 

 turesque promontory. We had been slowly working away at the 

 oars, for the wind had completely died away, and were rounding a 

 point on Duke Island, when we espied one of these little houses 

 perched far up on a rocky point which was piled high with innu- 

 merable drift. We were soon ashore Avith the camera and found our- 



