ON THE NORTH-WESTERN TRIBES OF CANADA. 547 



north of Mexico, and that Be is too experienced an ethnologist to hold 

 that all savages are alike in their characteristics.' His paper, it should 

 be added, is illustrated by a 'linguistic map,' which in clearness and ful- 

 ness is a model of what such a map should be. 



The third recent work of special importance in connection with this 

 study is the monograph of Mr. A. S. Gatschet, the eminent linguist of 

 the Bureau of Ethnology, on ' The Klamath Indians of South-western 

 Oregon,' which fills two quarto volumes of over 700 pages each in the 

 series of ' Contributions to North American Ethnology.' The work bears 

 date in 1890, but was not distributed until the following year. It is 

 doubtless the most complete and scientifically exact account of the 

 character, language, and mythology of a people coniposing a single ' stock ' 

 that has ever been published. Of their social organisation less is told. 

 The author had made large collections on this subject, but lack of space 

 has compelled him to defer their publication. He has, however, told 

 enough to enable us to compare the main features in the social life of 

 these Indians, who are surely ' primitive ' and ' typical ' savages, if there 

 are any such, with the systems devised by McLennan, Bachofen, Morgan, 

 and other ingenious theorisers. Mr. Gatschet, as becomes an investigator, 

 is strictly impartial, and has no special system to maintain ; but by a 

 simple statement of facts he is able in four lines to upset as many theories. 

 ' The Klamath Indians,' he tells us, ' are absolutely ignorant of the gentile 

 or clan system as prevalent among the Haida, Tlingit, and Eastern 

 Indians of North America. Matriarchate is also unknown among them. 

 Everyone is free to many within or without the tribe, and the children 

 inherit from the father.' 



To those who possess Mr. Gatschet's volumes the comparison between 

 their contents and those of Dr. Chamberlain's equally authentic and 

 careful observations will be highly interesting. But probably to most 

 students the comparison of this report on the Kootenays with the no less 

 careful and accurate descriptions of the coast tribes of British Columbia 

 belonging to the Tlingit, Tsimpshian, and Kwakiutl-Nootka stocks, as 

 furnished to our committee by Dr Franz Boas in his successive reports, 

 will be still more instructive. The notable difference of character which 



• I may be allowed to quote here a note from my ' Ethnography and Philology ' of 

 the U.S. Exploring Expedition (p. 13), which has been thought worthy of citation by 

 various writers on anthropological subjects: — 'Nothing is more common in the 

 writings of many voyagers than such phrases as the following : " These natives, like 

 all savages, are cruel and treacherous " ; " The levity and fickleness of the savage- 

 character " ; " The tendency to superstition which is found among all uncivilised 

 tribes"; "The parental affections which warm the most savage heart," &c. These 

 expressions are evidently founded on a loose idea that a certain sameness of charac- 

 ter prevails among barbarous races, and especially that some passions and feelings 

 are found strongly developed in all. A little consideration will show that this view 

 must be erroneous. It is civilisation that produces uniformity. The yellow and 

 black races of the Pacific, inhabiting nearly contiguous islands, differ more widely 

 from each other than do any two nations of Europe. The points of resemblance 

 between the negroes of Africa and the Indians of America, even under the same lati- 

 tudes, are very few. In delineating the character of the different races of the 

 Pacific an attempt will be made, by contrasting them with one another, to show 

 more closely the distinguishing characteristics of each.' And further on (p. 198), in 

 the description of the tribes of Oregon, a remark to the same effect is made : — ' To 

 one ascending the Columbia the contrast presented by the natives above and below 

 the Great Falls (the Chinooks and Wallawallas) is very striking. No two nations of 

 Europe differ more widely in looks and character than do these neighbouring sub- 

 divisions of the American race.' 



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