CAEEIBE SOCIOLOGY. 121 



eastern neighbours. The sweat-houses (tsé-zdl) of the latter were also of exactly Shush wap 

 pattern. 



As regards succession to rank and property, the heterogeneous neighbours of the 

 ChiiKoh'tin, the Bilqula, the Kwakwiutl and the Southern Salish tribes are governed by 

 father right. Nov^% it so happens that the present head chief of the Chi^Koh'tiu, AnaRèm, 

 is the immediate successor in the chieftainship of his father, who was also called 

 AnaRèm. This would be utterly impossible among the Carriers, who have borrowed from 

 the Tsimshiau the matriarchate, which is unknown to the bulk of the Déné nation, to 

 which they belong. 



I trust that the most exacting sceptic may now confess that the Denes are indeed a 

 borrowing nation. 



And yet this is not all. Let us now investigate their national mode of disposing 

 of their dead, and compare it with that obtaining among the Carriers and the 

 ChiiKoh'tin. Among the eastern and intermediate tribes (such as the Tsé'kènne and the 

 Rocky Mountains Nah'ane) it consisted simply — especially if travelling — in pulling 

 down the brush hut on the remains and proceeding on their journey, or if stationed at 

 any place, or even while travelling, if impelled by special consideration for the deceased, 

 by erecting for the remains a rough scaffolding, wherein they were incased as in a kind 

 of primitive coffin constructed of slender poles or the limbs of trees. Then, as a rule, the 

 birch-bark canoe of the dead person was left upside down by way of cover to this aerial 

 grave. Let us hear Petitot on this point ; 



" Dans les tribus Déné-Dindjié qui ont conservé l'usage antique et général aux Peaux- 

 Eouges, les morts sont déposés eii cache dans un coffre très grossier et à claire- voie, fait de 

 petits troncs d'arbre encoches et élevé de trois à sept pieds au-dessus du sol. Les vêtements, 

 les armes et les ustensiles du défunt sont ensevelis avec lui ou bien lancés au gré du 

 courant. Tous les objets ayant appartenu au défunt et qui ne peuvent être cachés avec lui 

 sont sacrifiés. On les brûle, on les jette à l'eau, ou bien on les suspend dans les arbres." ' 



Sometimes — as among the Tsé'kènne, and even some eastern tribes, as appears 

 from the same author's letters — - the corpse was also hidden, in a standing position, in a 

 tree hollowed out for the purpose. In no case was it ever cremated. Now, what do we 

 see among the Carriers and ChilKoh'tiu ? When the former came in contact with the 

 Tsimshiau races they could not fail to notice that cremation was practised by them, and at 

 the time of the discovery of their country all the subdivisions of their tribe burnt their 

 dead and erected for the few remaining bones mortuary columns identical with those in 

 vogue among the Tsimshiau. On the other hand, the Chi^Koh'tin, who are coterminous 

 with the Shushwap, who bury their dead, at once adopted interment as the final disposal 

 of them. 



To come to the object of Dr. Boas's note quoted in a previous paragraph : The Tsimshiau 

 races may have remotely influenced, through the Carriers, the mourning customs of the 

 Shushwap ; but I think it highly improbable, on account of the little intercourse the 

 main body of these tribes had together, as will be easily explained by a glance at the 



' Monographie des Déné-Dindjié, p. xxvi. 



- In Missions de la Congrégation des Oblats de Marie Immaculée, Paris,passim. That custom — though remembered 

 even here — nevertheless appears to have obtained more especially iu ancient times. 



Sec. IL, 1892. 16. 



