582 REPORT—1890. 
animal is henceforth, as it were, a relation of the shaman, and helps him 
whenever he is in need of help. He is not allowed to speak about his 
Wk’ a'yin, not even to say what shape it has. When he returns from the 
woods the shaman is able to cure diseases, to see and to catch souls, &e. 
The best time of the day for curing disease is at nightfall. A number of 
people are invited to attend the ceremonies. The patient is deposited 
near the fire, the guests sit around him. Then they begin to sing and 
beat time with sticks. The shaman (who uses no rattle) has a cup of 
water standing next to him. He takes a mouthful, blows it into his 
hands, and sprinkles it over the sick person. Then he applies his mouth 
to the place where the disease is supposed to be and sucks at it. As 
soon as he has finished sucking, he produces a piece of deer-skin or the like, 
as thongh he had extracted it from the body, and which is supposed to 
have produced the sickness. If the soul of the sick person is supposed 
to be absent from the body the shaman sends his tl’k’’d/yin (not his 
soul) in search. The ¢/’k’a'yin brings it, and then the shaman takes it 
and puts it on the vertex of the patient, whence it returns into his 
body. These performances are accompanied by a dance of the shaman. 
Before the dance the si’dua must ‘give name to the earth,’ which else 
would swallow the shaman. When acting as a conjurer for sick persons 
he must keep away from his wife, as else his powers might be interfered 
with. He never treats members of his own family, but engages another 
shaman for this purpose. It is believed that he cannot cure his own 
relatives. Rich persons sometimes engage a shaman to look after their 
welfare. 
The shaman is able to harm a person as well as to cure him. He 
causes sickness by throwing a piece of deer-skin, or a loop made of a 
thong, on to his enemy. If someone has an enemy whom he wants 
to harm he endeavours to obtain some of his saliva, perspiration, or 
hair, the latter being the most powerful means, particularly when taken 
from the nape or from the crown of the head. This he gives to the 
shaman without saying to whom it belongs, and pays him for bewitching 
it. I did not learn the method of treating these excretions of the enemy’s 
body, except that the performance takes place at nighttime. Then 
the man to whom the saliva, perspiration, or hair belongs undergoes 
cramps and fits. The sQuni/am, as well as the si/dua, may take the 
soul of an enemy and shoot it with arrows or with a gun, and thus 
kill their enemy. If a man is ‘too proud and insolent’ the doctor 
will harm him by simply looking at him. It is told of one shaman that 
he made people sick by giving them charred human bones to eat. 
The third function of the shaman is to detect evil-doers, particularly 
thieves, and enemies who made a person sick by employing a shaman. 
They solve this task by the help of their tl’k‘a’yin. When it is assumed 
or proved that a man has caused the sickness of another the latter 
or his relatives may kill the evil-doer, 
II. THE NOOTKA. 
Our knowledge of the Nootka is not so deficient as that of most other 
tribes of British Columbia, as their customs have been described very 
fully by G. M. Sproat in his book ‘Scenes and Studies of Savage Life’ 
(London, 1868). The descriptions given in the book are lively and 
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