74 THE ROYAL SOCIETY OF CANADA 



case of inherited dances performed at potlatches, where lej^end, dance, 

 mask, and sono- form another such unit. 



After the <;ame was disposed of, the women started in to sinj; 

 tldtna songs, which are generally sung at pul)erty ceremonies, though 

 songs of the same style are also in use elsewhere. These have a rather 

 bi'ight and rapid movement to them and arc accompanied l)y briskly 

 executed drum beats. To drum well and i)i'ccisely for u t\<iniâ song, 

 indeed, is considered quite an art. Differing in this respect from so 

 many types of Nootka songs, they are not, as a general inile, the exclu- 

 sive property of particular families, but are popular tunes that may 

 be used by all. One of the women who were seated on the floor l)eat 

 an accompaniment on the hand drum, while other women beat sticks 

 or clapped hands in the same rhythm. Several women danced or 

 rather swayed as for the other songs, except that both hands w^ere held 

 out and, at certain beats, held to one side of the body and parallel to 

 each other. The texts of tlamu songs are in part burdens, in part con- 

 nected words that are often sung out loud while the drum stops beating, 

 so that all may hear cleaily. The reason of this is that, while the tunes 

 and bui'dens ai'e well known and preserved intact, the texts propei 

 (or "choruses," as they were sometimes termed by my interpreters) 

 are very frequently changed to suit the occasion. A t\ama singer or 

 singers will often get up surprises in this way. The content of the texts 

 is of a satirically sexual character, very often a jil)e aimed at some man 

 who was known to have done something of a sexual character to make 

 him seem ridiculous. Thus, the words of one of the songs were to the 

 effect: "When a man hugs a woman, he is not supposed to suck her 

 breasts," evidently a sally at somebody's expense. Some women are 

 said to be particularly expert at making up such i\ama texts and are 

 called tla'mik. After the women had sung and danced a number 

 ■of these songs, the drum was handed over to one of the men. It was 

 now the men's turn to sing flawa songs, which they now proceeded to do 

 to the accompaniment of drum and beating of planks, leveling good- 

 humored shafts of ridicule at the opposite sex. In this way the men 

 and women relieved each other from time to time, singing one tlarna 

 song after another. A spirit of high good-humor prevailed, with plenty 

 of laughter. The men's and women's tlama songs are quite distinct; 

 sometimes the former will join in witii the women in their songs, very 

 rarely, if at all, the women in the men's son<i;s.* 



*Thc singing of satirical songs at a girl's puberty t-ert'inony Inuis a rather 

 striking parallel among the Dicgueno Indians of Southern California, among whom, 

 at a girl's adolescence ceremony, it is customary to sing "bad" songs in ridicule of 

 people of other villages who have recently died. See T. T. Waterman, The Religious 

 Practices of the Dicgueno Indians, University of California Publications in American 

 Archaeology and Ethnology, vol. 8, 1910, p. 290. 



