828 REPOET— 1889. 



9. TsEnHk"'ai6. Post : TsEnHk''aio (a species of eagle). Beams: Sea- 

 lion. Post: Ts'E'nHk-'aio. Heraldic colamn : A little man with a thick 

 beUy. 



10. Gye'qsEm. Heraldic column : Long pole, the base of which rests 

 on a man, on top of which stands a crane, its beak turned downward, 

 and a double-headed snake (Sisiutl). 



This very fragmentary list shows that each gens uses certain carvings 

 for certain purposes. The details of the carvings of their houses are 

 prescribed by the legendary description of the house of the ancestor, and 

 so are their masks and their heraldic columns. I would call attention to 

 the important fact that the dancing implements and the dances themselves 

 belong to the crest of the tribe, or, more properly speaking, to the customs 

 and carvings to which the gens is entitled. 



The distinction of what constitutes a gens and what a tribe is still 

 more difiBcult among the Coast Salish. Their legends are very much like 

 those of the Kwakiutl. They tell of fabulous ancestors who descended 

 from heaven and built houses. From these a certain group of families, 

 who always inhabit one village, derive their origin. They call them- 

 selves from the place at which their village stands, or which they claim 

 as their original home. Whenever they leave their home, they take 

 the name of their old village to the new place, although the name is 

 generally a geographical one, taken from certain peculiarities of the 

 locality. For instance, the name Tsime'nes means ' where the landing 

 is close by the house,' an epithet that was well adapted to their former 

 village at the mouth of Cowitchin River, but not to their new home at 

 Ohimenes. Many such instances might be enumerated. Some of these 

 gentes have certain prerogatives and certain carvings, but these are of 

 very little importance when compared to those of the Kwakiutl, among 

 whom they exert a ruling iniluence over their whole life. The Snanai- 

 muq, for instance, have the following gentes : Te'wEtqEn, Te'cEqEn, 

 K'oltsi'owotl, Qsa'loqul, Anue'nes. Among these only the first and the 

 second are allowed to use masks, which have the shape of beavers, ducks, 

 or salmon. Each gens has its own proper names. 



I have so far stated only in a very general way that the northern 

 tribes have a maternal, the southern a paternal organisation. It remains 

 to give some more details on this important subject. One of the main 

 facts is, that the phratries, viz. gentes of the Tlingit, Haida, Tsimshian, 

 and Heiltsnk", are exogamous, not only among each tribe, but throughout 

 the whole region. A member of the eagle gens of the Heiltsuk', for in- 

 stance, cannot marry a member of the eagle phratry of the Tlingit. 

 Those gentes are considered identical which have the same crest. I do 

 not know whether any such law prevails in the case of marriages between 

 the Kwakiutl and Heiltsuk', which, however, seem to be of very rare 

 occurrence. Neither was I able to arrive at a fully satisfactory conclu- 

 sion regarding the question whether marriages inside a gens of the 

 Kwakiutl are absolutely prohibited, but I believe that such is the case. 

 This difficulty arises from the fact that the Kwakiutl considers 

 himself as belonging half to his mother's, half to his father's gens, while 

 he uses the crest of his wife. I do not know of a single instance of a 

 Kwakiutl marrying a member of his own gens. The Salish gentes, for 

 instance those of the Sk'qo'mic, are not exogamous, but I am not quite 

 positive whether this is true in all cases. 



I do not intend in the present chapter to discuss the customs refer- 



