234 COILED BASKETRY IN BRITISH COLUMBIA  [etH. ayy. 41 
stitches. Of these very many show only horizontal lies encircling 
the basket at regular intervals. A number of modern specimens 
are exactly of the same kind. The horizontal lines are imbricated 
or beaded (pls. 8, d; 9, a; 27, d, f,g). The diagonal (pl. 31, 6, d) and 
vertical lines (pls. 14, a; 34, a—c; 35, 6) and the horizontally or verti- 
cally trending zigzags are imbricated (pls. 10, a; 11, 6; 14, e; 18, a; 
22 C2356): 
Us or Cotors 
Only rarely is any fixed connection established between color and 
design, the aim usually being merely to obtain a contrast. In the 
arrangement of parts, white is often employed to separate red from 
black or as a border around patterns executed in these colors. It is 
always used for backgrounds, except in rare cases on small baskets 
for which enough purple has been secured. Perhaps because there 
are so few colors in use, practically any design may be carried out in 
any one of them, and usually no attempt is made to give a more 
realistic effect by selecting the one most suitable. For instance, 
panthers may be black, red, white, or spotted. Of the few known 
designs which are always carried out in the same color, those repre- 
senting rain, hail, and snow are examples. The first is invariably 
red or black, the last two are white, snow being differentiated from 
hail by its spotted formation. Where berries are depicted the 
red currant (laa’za) is red, the service berry black. 
Attempts were occasionally made to take advantage of the natural 
colors or shades of splints and grass. The darker colored splints used 
for sewing were put in one place and the lighter in another. Thus a 
basket might have all the lower coils, perhaps a third of the entire 
surface, imbricated in dark colors, the rest being lighter. Also, in 
the same way but more rarely, grass was selected according to its 
color—white, yellow, or purple—and used (each color by itself) for 
imbricating certain sections. Baskets imbricated entirely in grass 
were very rare. However, this plan of segregation of colors was 
not often adopted, owing to the great diversity in shades of a given 
color." 
BEADED DESIGNS 
There are not many photographs of baskets bearing beaded 
patterns, and in the few that do illustrate this technique the work 
is of the simplest kind which in the photographs, unless taken at 
close range, is not to be readily distinguished from imbrication. Mr. 
Teit has furnished a number of sketches of different patterns which 
he has seen during his many years spent among the Thompson 
Indians and these are reproduced here with such comment as he has 
supplied. It will prove instructive to return to these figures after 
the study of imbricated design has been completed, in order to note 
41 See p. 153. 
