Oy Ft eg PEN. a 
daneng th 
_ 
a ee ee, 
RFT Sse 
« A TRAMP WITH REDSKINS.” 247 
tionate and even caressing nature. If the older men 
are not so often seen to give outward signs of affeétion 
for their women-kind, this is, after all, not unlike 
what may be seen in more civilized societies; nor 
does this reticence indicate that the affeétion does not sur- 
vive youth, Moreover, among these redfolk it is certainly 
the case that the older women, or at any rate those of 
them who have developed most charaéter, often exercise 
what would appear to us an even undue influence, in 
deciding what their menfolk, their family, or the members 
of their settlement, are to do. A very curious and 
extreme case came under my notice some years ago 
among the Caribs, who are supposed to be the most 
manly of the tribes. In that case, the men being 
for some reason unwilling to earn pay for some assis- 
tance which I wanted them to give me, these were 
brought to look at the matter in another light, and 
to give me the required help, by the vigorous use by 
their womenfolk not of argument but of well applied 
sticks, Again, just as there is thus an explanation of the 
negleét with which these redmen seem to the casual 
white-skinned observer to treat their women, so there is 
an explanation of the other and analogous faét that these 
same redmen seem to leave what appears to us an undue 
proportion of the domestic labour to the women. Asa 
matter of faét, the division of labour between the two sexes 
is exa€tly that which best adapts the society to exist 
among the circumstances which surround it. The women 
cook when at home, and do the planting in the 
fields, and carry the impedimenta on the journeys, in 
order that the men may be free to devote their greater 
physical strength and aptitude to the harder work of 
12 
