154 PROCEEDINGS OF THE CANADIAN INSTITUTE. 



meant as an illustration of the chant executed by the crowd who 

 kept beating time by clapping their hands one against the other. 

 Besides, on grand occasions Indian tambourines were also used as an 

 accompaniment to the singing. 



Religious dances were unknown. The nearest approach thereto 

 •was the dance performed on the occasion of an eclipse. The Den^s 

 believed this phenomenon to be due to the presence of gale or scab on 

 the sun or moon. To preserve themselves from that dread malady 

 and hasten the luminary's re-appeai"ance (or cure), they would 

 cautiously go out of their habitations, avoiding noise and loud talk, 

 and then, ranging themselves one behind the other, they would start 

 ^ kind of propitiatory dance to this eifect : bending under an imaginary 

 weight though carrjing only an empty bark vessel, they would strike 

 in cadence their right thigh, repeating at the same time in piteous 

 tones '^ Hanintih ; ge!" "Come back thei'efrom." 



On such occasions the Chilh;^otins neither danced nor sang ; but 

 among them men and women having their clothes tucked up as when 

 they travel and leaning on a staff as if heavily laden, they walked in 

 a circle till the end of the eclipse. 



Another observance formei-ly in vogue among the Carriers was the 

 the' tsoelr woes (precipitate exit). This was analogous in character to, if 

 not identical with, a practice of which we read as having existed 

 among certain European and Asiatic nations, the Lycanthropia of the 

 ancients, the Loujygarou of France, the Persian Ghoule the Teutonic 

 Wehrirolf ; all probably the i-esult of a simulated ecstacy of super- 

 stitious origin. In the case in question and on the occasion of a 

 lai'ge gathering of aborigines, a band of men would suddenly run out 

 of a lodge and, simulating madness, would, amidst wild yells and in- 

 coherent songs, make fi'antic efforts to bite the passers-by or, failing 

 in this, they would seize upon a dog and devour him on the spot. 



Ordinary amusements consisted of the ncezaz, or throwing of long 

 polished sticks on the snow, the distance reached determining the 

 winner ; and gambling which is of two kinds : noeta and alte. The 

 first game which greatly resembles the tsi-mei of the Chinese ^ is 

 played by a group of natives one of whom concealing in his hands 



1 L' Empire Chinois, par 1' abb6 Hue. 



