398 



DOMESTICATION 



[b. a. e. 



so that these may give notice of danger 

 or advantage. The coyote is said to re- 

 veal the presence of the mountain lion. 

 Small animals are tolerated for their 

 skins and flesh. Plants would be sown 

 to attract such creatures as bees, and 

 tame animals would be regularly fed at 

 later stages. 



2. Confinement is represented by such 

 activities as keeping fish and other aquatic 

 animals in ponds; caging birds and carry- 

 ing off their young, gallinaceous fowl last; 

 tying up dogs or muzzling them; cor- 

 ralling ruminants, and hobbling or teth- 

 ering wild horses so as to have them near, 

 keep them away from their enemies, or 

 fatten them for eating. The aborigines 

 had no difficulty in breeding some ani- 

 mals in confinement, but few wild birds 

 will thus propagate, and the Indians could 

 obtain those to tame only by robbing 

 nests. Lawson says of the Congaree of 

 North Carolina that "they take storks 

 and cranes before they can fly and breed 

 them as tame and familiar as dung-hill 

 fowls." 



3. Keeping animals for their service or 

 produce, as dogs for retrieving game or 

 catching fish, hawks for killing birds; 

 various creatures for their fleece, hides, 

 feathers, flesh, milk, etc., and taming 

 them for amusement and for ceremonial 

 or other purposes, were a later develop- 

 ment. Roger Williams says the Narra- 

 ganset Indians of Rhode Island kept tame 

 hawks about their cabins to frighten small 

 birds from the fields. 



4. Actually breaking them to work, 

 training dogs, horses, and cattle for pack- 

 ing, sledding, hauling travois, and, later, 

 for riding, constitutes complete domesti- 

 cation. 



In pre-Columbian times the dog was 

 the most perfectly subdued animal of 

 the North Americans, as much so as the 

 llama in w. South America. But other 

 species of mammals, as well as birds, were 

 in different degrees rendered tractable. 

 After the coming of the whites the meth- 

 ods of domesticating animals were per- 

 fected, and their uses multiiilied. More- 

 over, horses, sheep, cattle, donkeys, hogs, 

 and poultry were added to the list, and 

 these profoundly modified the manners 

 and customs of many Indian tribes. 



Domestication of animals increased the 

 food supply, furnished pets for old and 

 young, aided in raising the Indian above 

 the plane of low savagery, helped him to 

 go about, multiplied his wants, furnished 

 a standard of property and a medium of 

 exchange, took the load from the back 

 of women, and provided more abundant 

 material for economic, artistic, and cere- 

 monial purposes. 



Domestication had a different develop- 

 ment in each culture area. In the Arctic 



region the dog was preeminent; it was 

 reared with unremitting care, the women 

 often suckling the puppies; all its life it 

 was trained to the sled. As the dogs were 

 never perfectly tamed, it was no easy task 

 to drive a team of them; yet by the aid 

 of dogs and sleds, in combination with 

 umiaks, the whole polar area of America 

 was exploited by the Eskimo, who found 

 these an excellent means of rapid transit 

 from Asia to the Atlantic. In recent years 

 the successful introduction of the reindeer 

 among the Alaskan tribes has proved a 

 blessing. The Mackenzie-Yukon district 

 is a canoe country, and domestication of 

 the dog was not vigorously prosecuted 

 until the Hudson's Bay Company gave 

 the stimulus. But southward, among the 

 Algonquian and Siouan tribes of the great 

 lakes and the plains, this animal attained 

 its best as a hunter and a beast of burden 

 and traction. It was also reared for food 

 and for ceremonial purposes. Not more 

 than 50 pounds could be borne by one 

 dog, buttwice that amount could be moved 

 on a travois. The coming of the horse 

 ( q. V. ) to the great plains was a boon to the 

 Indian tribes, all of which at once adopted 

 the new instrument of travel and transpor- 

 tation. The horse was apotheosized; it 

 became a standard of value, and fostered 

 a greater diversity of occupations. But 

 the more primitive methods of domesti- 

 cation were still practised throughout 

 the middle region. In the n. Pacific area 

 dogs were trained to hunt; but here and 

 elsewhere this use of the dog was doul)tless 

 learned from the whites. Morice writes 

 of the Athapascan tribes of the interior 

 of British Columbia: ' ' Owing to the semi- 

 sedentary state of those Indians and the 

 character of their country, only the dog 

 was ever domesticated among them in 

 the common sense of the word. This 

 had a sort of wolfish aspect, and was 

 email, with pointed, erect ears, and uni- 

 formly gray, circumstances which would 

 seem to imply thatthe domesticating proc- 

 ess had remained incomplete. The flesh 

 of those wolf dogs was relished by the em- 

 ployees of the Northwestern and Hudson's 

 Bay companies, who did not generally eat 

 that of those of European descent. In a 

 broader sense, those aborigines also oc- 

 casionally domesticated and have con- 

 tinued to domesticate other animals, such 

 as black bears, marmots, foxes, etc. , which 

 they took when young and kept as pets, 

 tied up to the tent post or free. Such 

 animals, as longas they remained in a state 

 of subjection, were considered as members 

 of the family and regarded as dogs, though 

 often called hy the endearing names 

 of 'sons,' 'daughters,' 'grandsons,' etc. 

 Birds were never caged, but might be seen 

 at times hobbling about with the tips of 

 their wings cut." 



