THEIR LANGUAGE—CLANS. ves) 
yet the Hupa was not only the French of the reservation, the idiom of 
diplomacy and of intercourse between tribes, but it was also in general use 
within each rancheria. I tried in vain to get the numerals of certain obscure 
remnants of tribes; they persisted in giving me the Hup4, and in fact they 
seemed to know no other. 
They remind one somewhat of the Mussulmans, who are forbidden by 
the Koran to learn any foreign tongue except Arabic. As the Sultans for 
four centuries had no interpreters save the versatile Greeks of the Phanari- 
otic quarter of Constantinople, so among the tribes surrounding the Hupa I 
found many Indians speaking three, four, five, or more languages, always 
including Hupa, and generally English. Yet I do not think this was due 
to any particular intellectual superiority or brilliance on the part of the 
Hupa, so much as to their physical force. 
Notwithstanding the Hupa were so powerful in their foreign relations, 
they were divided into many clans or towns, and these were often arrayed 
in deadly hostility. These clans were named as follows: Hos’-ler, Mi-til’-ti, 
Tish-tan’-a-tan, Wang’-kat, Chail’-kut-kai-tuh, Mis’-kut, Chan-ta-kdé-da, Hiin- 
sa-tung, Wis’-so-man-chuh, Mis-ke-toi-i-tok, Hass-lin’-tung. The Hupa 
owned the Trinity from its mouth up to Burnt Ranch, which is a little above 
the mouth of New River; but that part of it between the mouth of South 
Fork and Burnt Ranch they occupied only in summer. It is a region rich 
in acorns and manzanita-berries, and they allowed the Chim-a-ri-ko to 
gather these products from it after they had helped themselves. Here too 
on this quasi-neutral ground, they met the latter tribe in summer for barter, 
and for the annual collection of tribute. 
They were not involved in so many wars with the Americans as were 
some of the brave but foolhardy tribes farther up the river. One reason 
was that the Americans did not prosecute mining on the Lower Trinity to 
the same extent that they did on New River and the Middle and Upper 
Trinity ; hence the salmon-fishing of the Hupa was not so much interrupted 
by muddy water—a fruitful source of trouble in early days—nor did they 
themselves come so much in contact with the miners as did those tribes far- 
ther up the river. 
Their primitive dress, implements, and houses were almost precisely 
