1 64 Transactions of the Royal Canadian Institute [vol. x 



sians who deal with them, and who are none of the most squeamish, 

 are themselves not able to endure it".^ 



Another article of diet, which is not so repulsive to a civilized palate 

 or nostril, but yet quite as novel to either, is the sap of certain coniferous 

 trees, which is relished by both Yakuts and Western Denes. "In 

 February and March is their Harvest, when the Sap rises in the Trees", 

 writes of the former the author just quoted from; "for they go into 

 the Woods, cut down young Pine-Trees, take off the inner Bark or 

 Bast, which they carry home and dry for their Winter's Provision ".^ 

 The same can be said of the Northwest American Indians, with this 

 only qualification that they do not cut the trees down, but shave off 

 the sap with special bone implements. 



Strange to say, the very relatives of the people who are so disgusting 

 in their diet cannot stand the sight of clean fish or water-fowl. 

 According to Prj6valski, "la repugnance du Mongol a. cet egard est telK 

 qu'une fois, sur les bords du lac Koukou-Nor, nos chameliers nous 

 voyant manger une sarcelle furent pris de vomissements".^ 



Compare this repugnance of an Asiatic tribe for water animals with 

 the quite as great aversion entertained therefor by the Navahoes and 

 Apaches, the two principal divisions of the Southern Den6s. This 

 peculiarity among them is so striking that it was made the subject of 

 a paper in the "Journal of the American Folk- Lore" by the late Wash- 

 ington Matthews, who wrote, among other things: 



"I found that the Navahoes not only tabooed fish, but all things 

 connected with the water, including aquatic birds. Speaking of the 

 Navaho repugnance to fish with the landlady of the Cornucopia Hotel 

 (a slab shanty) at Fort Wingate, she related the following as a good 

 joke on the Indian. She employed a young Navaho warrior to do chores 

 around her kitchen. The Navaho warrior has no pride about the per- 

 formance of menial labour. He will do almost anything at which he 

 can earn money, and this one would do any work for her but clean fish. 

 He would eat, too, almost anything in her kitchen except fish. Noticing 

 his aversion to the finny tribe, she one day sportively emptied over his 

 head a pan of water in which salt fish had been soaked. The Indian 

 screamed in terror, and, running a short distance, tore in haste every 

 shred of clothing from his body and threw it all away. She learned 

 that he afterwards bathed and 'made a lot of medicine' to purify him- 

 self of the pollution. He never returned to work for her, so this little 

 trick cost her a good servant".* 



1 S. Muller, op. cit., p. IX. 



* Ibid., p. III. 



' Op. cit., p. 40. 



* "Ichthyophobia" (Journal of American Folk-Lore, p. 106). 



