CARRIER SOCIOLOGY. 117 



populous, surrounded by cougenious peoples, and, therefore, more likely to keep aloof 

 from foreign practices. If we look iuto the social system of those large tribes untouched 

 by alien inllueuces, what do we see ? I do not hesitate a moment to affirm that all 

 such institut ions as are common to the Carriers and Coast Indians, by contradistinction 

 from those upheld among all Indians as American aborigines, are absolutely unknown in 

 the main body of the Déné nation. Through the works of Rev. E. Petitot and the letters of 

 missionaries stationed among the Eastern Denes, as well as through personal observation 

 among the Sékanais (or Tse'kenne), who, sociologically speaking, are lîastern Dénés, I 

 have come to the conclusion that their social system differs as much from that of our 

 Carriers and ChiiKoh'tiu as European differs from Chinese civilization. 



In all the tribes of the Déné nation which have had no intercourse with Coast 

 Indians, patriarchate takes the place of the matriarchate obtaining here, and the clans, 

 with their totems ' and the social peculiarities derived therefrom are unknown. So are 

 the tribes' division into noble and common people, the right of the former, or any, to 

 particular hunting grounds, the potlaches or distribution feasts, as observed here,' the 

 burning of the dead, the protracted and systematic wooing of the young man before 

 winning over his intended wife's parents, etc. 



In view of these facts, is it probable, I would ask again, that a comparatively small 

 tribe, characterized by a remarkable recoptiveuess and power of self-appropriation, would 

 have originated a very elaborate social system totally unknown to the great mass of the 

 nation to which it belongs, while to this day that same system is tenaciously clung to by 

 alien peoples coterminous with it, and with it was formerly, in a commercial point of 

 view, in the relations of vassal to suzerain ^ I am very much mistaken if there can be 

 two answers to that question. Yet, as some may not feel satisfied with arguments of 

 such general nature, I shall now enter, as it were, into the kernel of the subject, and 

 endeavour to confirm my thesis by more detailed remarks, and by pointing out the 

 originators, or, at least unconscious propagators, of the most prominent customs and 

 institutions formerly in vogue among the Carriers and Chi[Koh'tin. 



CARRIER SOCIOLOGY EXOTIC— PROVED BY FACTS. 



First, as to the tribal division into noble and common people. Beyond the possibility 

 of a doubt, it owes its existence to the intercourse of the Carriers with the Tsimshian 

 tribes, especially the Kitikson. 



Before I proceed further, I must be permitted a remark which I deem necessary in this 

 connection. When, speaking of our aborigines, I call their headmen nobles or notables, 

 I should not be understood as referring to any social class different ' from that whose 



' Petitot (Monographie des Dt^né-Dindjié, p. xxiii) speaks of the totems as being familiar to tlie Eastern Dtînés ; 

 but these are pcr.^ona/, not (/en(a/, totems, and everybody knows that there is a very wid3 difference between the 

 two- Personal totems are revealed in dreams to individuals, and as such were also known here independently of 

 gental totems, with which they have nothing — save the name — in common. 



-' I am well aware that among the Ea.stern and intermediate DénOs it is not a rare occurrence to see succps.'^ful 

 hunters share with others the fruit of their expedition, which would otherwise soon get spoiled. But here, again, I 

 need not remark that such patriarchal repasts totally differ from the ceremonial banquets formerly in vogne 

 of the Rockies. Cf. " The Western Dénés," p. 147 et seq. /ç^ 



