192 TRANSACTIONS OF THE CANADIAN INSTITUTE. [V'OL. V'. 



the sun, others the moon, some birds and others beasts of prey. A hirge 

 number painted imaginary beings, who, according to this poor people's 

 behef, inhabited the elements, the earth, the sea, the air, etc. * * * 

 I observed, as a singular fact, that my company, which seemed to have 

 so far ignored all subordination, in this horrible circumstance exhibited 

 the greatest uniformity of will and sentiment. Reunited among them- 

 selves for the same purpose, all the Indians were ready to follow 

 Matonabbee wherever he wished to lead them. * * * Never in any 

 assembly of men did private interest hasten more eagerly to make 

 sacrifices for the public good than on this occasion, for, whatever an 

 individual had in possession, he at once shared with him who was desti- 

 tute of it. All that friendship, generosity, disinterestedness, could effect 

 upon the heart of a Northern Indian was never developed so 

 brilliantly. One would have said that there reigned in this people 

 public spirit, a kind of national pride ; and the barbarians meditated the 

 most cowardl}' of crimes. * * * While we were in ambush, the 

 Indians made their final preparation for battle. Some painted their 

 faces black, others red, several a mixture of the two colours, and to 

 hinder their hair falling over their eyes, they tied it in front, behind, at 

 the sides, or cut it very short all round the head." When the massacre 

 and pillage were ended " they betook themselves to the top of a neigh- 

 bouring height, where, forming a circle, they sang several songs in 

 honour of their victory, brandishing and clashing their spears. Often 

 they interrupted the clangour to cry out Tinia ? Tinia ? in derision of 

 the poor Esquimaux, who had taken refuge on a sand bank where the 

 water was up to their knees." In Eskimo, ti))ia is a friendly greeting, 

 equivalent to : How do you do? 



Father Morice enumerates the arms of the Western Denes ; their 

 bows from four to five and a half feet long, their bone and flint arrow, 

 dart, and spear heads, and their stone casse tctes. He also mentions 

 their shields, " oval in form, like the Roman clypcus, and generally made 

 of closely interwoven branches of amelanchier alnifolia. While on the 

 warpath they also wore a kind of armour or cuirass consisting of dried 

 sticks of the same kind of wood, arranged in parallel order and kept 

 together with babiche lines interlaced in several places. This was 

 common to the Haidahs and other coast Indians." The fact that this 

 armour was found in Asia among the Tungus and the Tchuktchis, as 

 attested by Abernethy and Sauer, proves that it was introduced to 

 America by tribes of northern Asiatic derivation ; yet, Washington 

 Irving, in the twenty-second chapter of the second volume of his Astoria, 

 mentions it as part of the defensive armament of the Tsinuks, and 



