11 ô Father morice on 



researches do not iaclude the Tiuueh tribes, some of which are comparatively well 

 known." ' This " comparatively," the learned Doctor will pardon me for remarking, is 

 certainly not out of place here. " Well known," I am tempted to retort, are " some " of the 

 tribes whose social condition and philological peculiarities he has taken so great pains to 

 faithfully expose, such as arc, for instance, the Kwakwiutl, through the efforts of Dr. 

 G-. M. Dawson;- the Haida, through the same author's "Notes on the Haida," ' and, I 

 might almost say, all of the North-Western Coast Indians, through the writings of such 

 Americanists as G. M. Sproat,' J. Deans,' J. G. Swan,'' F. Poole,' H. H. Bancroft,' 0. T. 

 Mason," and a host of others, not mentioning the early explorers G-eo. Vancouver,"' G. Dixon," 

 Urey Lisiausky,'- etc. I would especially cite the lately published monograph " of 

 U. S. N. Ensign Albert P. Niblack, who, except in so far as philology and folk-lore are 

 concerned, may be said to have almost exhausted the subject. Our Carriers' sociology has 

 lost much in not being presented to the scientific world by such painstaking writers, 

 though I cannot but fancy that, to more easily comprehend and faithfully describe a 

 people's social system, one should iDreviously be conversant with its language, an 

 accomplishment of which few, if any, of the above-mentioned authors could boast. 



To the best of my knowledge, the only attempt made to give any idea of the Carriers' 

 institutions was the writer's paper, published in the ' Proceedings of the Canadian 

 Institute,' under the title: "The Western Denes ; Their Manners and Customs." "Although 

 I do not flatter myself with having thereby made them fully known to the readers of the 

 Transactions of the Royal Society of Canada, I feel that I cannot repeat here what I then 

 said in a somewhat lengthy essay. Therefore, I shall content myself with merely condensing 

 what information may be necessary to the full understanding of the remarks I shall oti'er as 

 an attempted answer to the initial question : " Are the Carrier Sociology and Mythology 

 Indigenous or Exotic ? " 



ETHNOLOGICAL, 



The Carriers constitute one of the western tribes of the great American family of 

 aborigines commonly called by ethnographers Tinneh, Tinne, or Athapaskau, appellations 

 which I have shown elsewhere ' ' to be inappropriate, and which, in my estimation, would 



' Fifth Report of the Committee, etc., p. 6, 1SS9. 



- Notes and Observations on the Kwakiool People of Vancou\'er Island. Montreal, 1887. 

 'Report on the Queen Charlotte Islands. Ann. Rep. Geol. Surv. Canada, 1878-79. 

 'Sceries and Studies of Savage Life- London, 18(58. 

 ^ Articles in the Victoria Colonist, and other publications. 

 « Ibid. 



' Queen Charlotte Islands. London, 1872 , 



' Native Races, vol. i. Wild Tribes. San Francisco, 1883. 

 ' Various papers in the Smithsonian publications. 

 '" A Voyage of Discovery, etc. 3 vols. London, 1798. 

 " A Voyage Round the World. London, 1789. 

 '- A Voyage Round the World in the Years 1803-06. London, 1814. 



'■'The Coast Indians of Southern Alaska and Northern British Columbia, in Annual Report, etc.— Report of 

 the U. S. National Museum. Washington, 1890. 

 '* Proc. Can. Inst., October, 1889. Toronto. 



'■'The Western Denes, etc., p. 109, note 2. It might be rejoined tliat ethnologists have merely adopted, as a 

 common denomination for the whole stock, the verbal suffix noticeable in the names of many tribes or tribal 

 subdivisions, just as it is practised by some with regard to the Nootka, or (according to them) Aht nation. In which 



