August 29, 1901J 



NA TURE 



427 



Lower Yukon the position of the corpse is similar, but 

 the head is forced forward between the knees. At Cape 

 \'ancouver exist certain memorial image-posts of drift- 

 wood, set up near the sea, either representing the human 

 figure or with a rude representation of some totem on 

 the top, which are said to be monuments to those whq 

 have died either in landslides or at sea, and whose bodies 

 have never been recovered. Among certain tribes a 

 great Feast to the Dead is celebrated, extending over 

 fi\e days. It is the usual thing, when a person dies, for 

 the next of kin to present food, drink and clothing to the 

 departed spirit, through the medmm of the dead person's 

 namesake, at the first festival to the Shades after the 

 death takes place. For some years this continues, the 

 men in the village each giving to their ancestors offer- 

 ings of various kinds, which are saved up by the chief 

 mourners, in whose hands they are deposited, until it is 

 considered that the village possesses a sufificient hoard 

 of gifts to admit of a Great Festival being held. A 

 certain date having been fixed upon, a kind of summons 

 is issued to the Shades at the next minor festival ; in- 

 vitation stakes, decked with the totems of each departed 

 spirit, are planted before their graves, and songs of in- 

 vitation are sung. After the observance of this great 

 feast, which Mr. Nelson describes in its entirety, an 

 Eskimo is held to be exempt from further rites and duties 

 to the dead uritil another near relation dies, when the 

 process begins again. 



The Eskimos, from the Kuskokwim River northward, 

 have a regular system of totem marks. Mr. Nelson tells 

 of a villager on the Lower Yukon who explained the 

 totems to him thus : " All of our people have marks 

 which have been handed down by our fathers from very 

 long ago, and we put them on all our things." For 

 instance, among the clan which bears the wolf totem 

 the men fasten a wolf tail to their belts, while the women 

 twine pieces of wolfskin in their hair, and it is customary 

 among them to mark their weapons with their totem, 

 that thereby (according to the author) they may assume 

 the qualities of such animals and become especially 

 deadly. With regard to the adoption of totems we may 

 notice the following story, told by a villager whose sign 

 was a red bear. Once upon a time one of his ancestors, 

 who was a celebrated hunter, while out one day after 

 small game with only blunt arrowheads in his quiver, 

 came across a large red bear. Nothing daunted, how- 

 ever, he let fly arrow after arrow, and — so runs the tale- 

 having succeeded in breaking all its bones, killed it. 

 From that time forth he and his descendants used the 

 red bear as their totem. 



In the cosmogony of the Eskimos it is held that the 

 earth was created by the Raven-Father, who is said to 

 have come from the sky and fashioned it when every- 

 thing was a watery chaos. Now although the earth had 

 been formed, it was as yet devoid of inhabitants, and 

 for the first four days Man lay ensconced in the pod of a 

 beach-pea. On the fifth day he burst the pod and came 

 forth a fully developed Man, and while he was still looking 

 about him the Raven flew up. " Where have you come 

 from ? " says the Raven ; and the Man points to the 

 empty shell of the pea. "Ah !" replies the Raven, '' I 

 made that vine, but never expected that anything like 

 you would come forth from it." So he takes Man away 

 and shows him how to satisfy his hunger with berries. 

 Like other animals in the stories, the Raven possesses 

 the power of assuming human form by the simple process 

 of pushing up his beak like a mask, and during his 

 colloquy with Man has availed himself of this. The 

 Raven then fashions some reindeer in clay and, drawing 

 down his mask, waves his wings four times over them 

 and they at once receive life ; but as they were only dry 

 in spots when they came into existence, their skins are 

 dappled and they become the tame reindeer of semi- 



NO. 1 66 1, VOL. 64] 



domesticity. A pair of wild reindeer are also formed, 

 and while the bellies are allowed to dry white, the re- 

 mainder is kept moist, and by this means the wild rein- 

 deer, which to this day are of a light colour only 

 underneath, are brought into being. Then the Raven 

 thinking of Man's loneliness, retires a short distance and 

 moulds an image in the shape of Man, fastening a long 

 tuft of grass at the back of the head for hair. With a 

 I wave of the Raven's wings as before, the clay doll is 

 transformed into a beautiful young woman, who in a 

 short time bears the Man a child. They take the child 

 to the riverside and smear him all over with clay, and in 

 three days he becomes a full-grown man. 



One day Man asks the Raven about the sky, and at his 

 request the Raven takes him up to heaven and shows him 

 the land he has made there — a beautiful country peopled 

 by a small race — and after being made welcome there he 

 returns through a star-hole to earth. But after a time 

 the Man hungers to return to the little people in the sky, 

 and he goes up again with the Raven. During his absence, 

 however, the earth-people increase so that the animals 

 are in danger of extermination, and this rouses the anger 

 of both Man and the Raven. So they catch ten reindeer, 

 which at this time have long, sharp teeth, and let them 

 loose one night on earth to ravage and destroy. For two 

 nights these fearful beasts attack houses and destroy the 

 inmates, but on the third the villagers bedaub their walls 

 with a paste made of fat and berries, so that when the 

 wild herd again begin to batter the walls with their teeth, 

 the sour berries cause them to rush about shaking their 

 heads so violently that finally all their sharp teeth drop 

 out, and this is the reason that all reindeer teeth are now 

 small and harmless. 



Another quaint story is the tradition which explains 

 the reason why the women in the north are deft with the 

 needle, while those of the south dance so nimbly. Long 

 ago the northland was inhabited by men only and no 

 woman had come among them ; but it was noised abroad 

 that far away in the south one woman dwelt alone. So 

 one day one of the northerners set his face soutiiward 

 and journeyed until he reached the woman's dwelling, 

 and in course of time he married her and congratulated 

 himself that he had a wife while the son of the headman 

 of the north was still a bachelor. But meanwhile this 

 same bachelor was travelling south with like purpose, 

 and he came on the house while the man was talking 

 within, and, hiding himself, waited until night fell. Thei> 

 he forced a way in, and, seizing the woman, began ti> 

 drag her away ; but the noise awoke the husband, 

 who leapt forth and grasped his wife's feet as she was 

 being dragged through the door. Both men pulled 

 violently and to such effect that the poor woman's body 

 was torn in half, and the robber went off home with the 

 upper part, while the legs were left behind. Then the 

 rightful husband carved a body of wood and fastened it 

 to the legs, and the other man completed his half in a 

 similar way, and as soon as they had finished, each addi- 

 tion received life, and out of one woman were made two. 

 But although the woman of the south could dance featly, 

 her wooden fingers prevented her from embroidering ; 

 and the woman of the north, by reason of her wooden 

 legs, e.xcelled only in needlework, and it is from these two 

 that the women of the north and south sprang, inheriting 

 their several characteristics. 



With this story we must take leave of Part i. Mr. 

 Nelson has done his work excellently, and the matter 

 has been arranged in a careful and scientific manner. 

 The Bureau of American Ethnology is greatly to be con- 

 gratulated, both on the indefatigable workers whose ser- 

 vices it has secured and on the excellent way in which 

 it has published their researches. We shall look for- 

 ward to the remainder of Mr. Nelson's work on the 

 Eskimos with interest. 



