1892-93.] 



NOTES ON THE WESTERN DEN^S. 



203 



F. G. Frazer, the principal authority on Totemism, says : " Considered 

 in relation to men, totems are of at least three kinds: (i) The clan 

 totem, common to a whole clan, and passing by inheritance from gener- 

 ation to generation ; (2) ihe sex totem . . . ; (3) the individual totem, 

 belonging to a single individual and not passing to his descendants."* 



Fig. 189. 



Of the sex totem I know practically nothing, as it does not obtain 

 among our Indians ; but to these three varieties of totem I can add a 

 fourth, which I shall call the honorific totem, and of which a full ex- 

 planation will be found further on. The individual or personal totem is 

 well known as being some material object or being, most generally some 

 animal, ordinarily revealed in dreams to a person who is bound thereafter 

 to look* upon it as sacred and to be especially revered and protected. 

 In return for this reverence on the part of the person, the totem is 

 believed to particularly help and powerfully protect its human relatir-, 

 as the individual is supposed to be. As for the clan totem, any reader 

 of Americana is too familiar with it to be in need of any definition or 

 explanation. One totem generally — though not always— corresponds to 

 one clan or gens, so that the former and the latter are very often in equal 

 numbers. Fourgentes obtain among the Carriers, of all which I herewith 

 submit the native names together with those of their respective totems. 



Gentes. 

 "jfsdmdc-yu. 

 Tsa-yu. 



Ydsil-yu. 

 Tdmten-yu. 



Totems. 

 The Grouse. 

 The Beaver. 

 The Toad. 

 The Grizzly Bear.f 



* Totemism, Edinburgii, 1887, p. i. 



t Judging from fig. 188, it would seem that the crow or raven is regarded as the totem of some 

 clan among the Lower Carriers. It is not known here in that capacity. 



