144 HUNTING AND FISHING BAGES 



lives — but in it very few infants are produced. Families on an 

 average contain three children . . . and ten is the greatest number 

 I have seen.' In Alaska ' the females of the coast tribes are not 

 fruitful, and to see four children of one mother is quite a rare 

 occurrence, one or two being the common number of children to 

 a family '.^ The evidence of Sproat for the Ahts and of Bancroft 

 for the Nootkas and the Chinooks has already been quoted.- 

 Among the Omahas ' the usual number of children may be* stated 

 at from four to six in a family '.^ Of the Sound Indians Bancroft 

 states that ' the women are not prohfic, three or four being 

 ordinarily the limit of their offspring '.^ The woman of the interior 

 of the Pacific Coast ' is not prolific ',^ and the number in a Chepe- 

 wayan family is on the average ^our.^ In California ' barrenness 

 was not infrequent, twins very uncommon, and the general 

 average of families did not exceed two children 'P Of the same 

 people Baegert states that ' it is certain that many of their women 

 are barren and that a great number of them bear not more than 

 one child '.^ Of the Comanches we read : ' they are not a prohfic 

 race ; indeed it is but seldom that a woman has more than three or 

 four children.' ^ Among the Puelches of South America ' children 

 are not nearly so numerous as might be imagined ' ; this is due in 

 part, however, according to the author, to infanticide.^" x\ccording 

 to Bridges, in Tierra del Fuego ' few women have more than six 

 children owing to the great length of time between the several 

 births '.11 Of the same people, Hyades and Deniker record their 

 opinion that four is the average number of children to a married 

 woman.i- They add that in spite of early marriage very few young 

 couples of eighteen to twenty years of age had any children, 

 although sterility was rare.^^ 



Of the other races which belong to this group the evidence points 

 to a similar conclusion.^* Man thinks that three or four is an 

 average number of children in an Andamanese family, and six is 



' Petroff, ' Report of the Population of Alaska ', 10th Census of the U.S.A., p. 127. 

 - p. 99. ^ S. H. Long, loc. cit., p. 19. See also Dorsey, 3rd A. R. B. E., p. 264. 



* Bancroft, loc. cit., vol. i, p. 218. ^ Ibid., p. 156. * Keating, 



Narrative, p. 156. ' Schoolcraft, loc. cit., vol. iii, p. 211. ' Baegert, 



A. R. B. E., 1863, p. 368. » Bancroft, loc. cit., vol. i, p. 513. '» Guin- 



nard, loc. cit., p. 143. " Bridges, A Voice from South America, vol. xiii, p. 202. 



'- Hyades and Deniker, loc. cit., vol. vii, p. 189. ** Ibid., p. 188. 



" It may be observed that according to Keane the Botocudos form an exception. 

 ' Families ', he say3, ' are said to be comparatively large, four or five children being 

 common enough ' (./. A. I., vol. xiii). This is, however, contradicted by von 

 Tschudi, Reisen durch Sudamerika, vol. ii, p. 284. 



