408 mi.LKTiN: miskim of comi'akativk zoology. 



on ranne 103:^ (Jesuit irlations, 1S07, 5. p. 105) mentions this use 

 of dogs in Bea\er hunting; "sometimes when the dogs encounter the 

 Beaver outside its house, they pursue and take it easily; I have never 

 seen this eliase, but ]\a\e been tokl of it; and the savages highly \alue 

 a dog -which scents and runs down this animal." Le Jeune speaks of 

 the familiarity of the Indian dogs, that in winter they are unable to 

 sleep outside and come into the cabins, lying and walking over the 

 inmates. Elsewhere he speaks of giving food to a 'petit chien,' but 

 adds that " the suAages do not throw to the dogs the bones of female 

 Beavers and Porcupines, — at least certain specified bones .... yet 

 they make a thousand exceptions to this rule, for it does not matter 

 if the vertelirae or nnnp of these animals be given to the dogs, but the 

 rest must be thrown into the fire." 



Testimony of early travellers is somewhat conflicting as to the 

 eating of their dogs by the Indians. Le Jeune states that "in the 

 famine which we endured, our savages would not eat their dogs, 

 because they said that, if the dog was killed to be eaten, a man would 

 be killed by blows from an axe." On other occasions, however, such 

 scruples were not observed. Thus Father Rasles, in a letter written 

 to his brother in 1710, from Narantsook, forty miles up the Kennebec 

 River, Maine, says that at the news of the French and English War, 

 the Indian young men were ordered by the older Indians to kill dogs 

 for the purpose of making the war-feast (Jesuit relations, 1897, 67, 

 p. 203) — possibly here with a view to sending their dogs on before, 

 should death o\ertake their masters. Feasts of dog-flesh seem to 

 have been commoner among the Indians of the West and South, and 

 Fremont in his narrative of his explorations (1845, p. 42) recounts 

 being invited, as a mark of honor, to a dog-feast. " The dog was in a 

 large pot over the fire, in the middle of the lodge, and immediately 

 on our arrival was dished up in large wooden bowls, one of which was 

 handed to each. The flesh appeared very glutinous, with something 

 of the flavor and appearance of mutton. Feeling something mo^'e 

 behind me, I looked round, and found that I had taken my seat among 

 a litter of fat young puppies." 



Harmon, writing in 1820, after nineteen years spent in travel 

 through the Northwest from Montreal to the Pacific, speaks of the 

 smaller dog used in hunting, and a larger dog as well. The latter is 

 rank and not good eating like the former, of whose flesh the Indians 

 and French Canadian voyageiirs were very fond. 



In the New England shell-heaps, the dog-remains occur either as 

 burials — the entire skeleton undisturbed — or as scattered portions, 



