THE INDIANS OF THE NORTHWEST COAST^ 325 



the endeavor to accumulate enough property or wealth to enable a free- 

 man to rise to this dignity of a petty chief. A great deal of mystery 

 has been thrown around these pictographic carvings, due to the igno- 

 rance and misconception of some writers and the reticence or deliberate 

 deception practiced by the Indians themselves. They are in no sense- 

 idols, but in general may be said to be ancestral columns. The legends 

 wfiich they illustrate are but the traditions, folk-lore, and nursery tales 

 of a primitive people; and, while they are in some sense childish or 

 frivolous and at times even coarse, they represent the current of human 

 thought as truly as do the ancient inscriptions in Egypt and Babylonia, 

 or the Maya inscriptions in Yucatan. The meaning of a few of these 

 columns may, by inference, be taken to represent the general character 

 of all. 



In Plate xxxv. Fig. 179, is a carved column in front of the model of 

 a Haida house. The surmounting figure represents Roots,* the brown 

 bear, which is the totem of the head of the household who erected it. 

 At the bottom is Tsing, the beaver, the totem of the wife and children. 

 Aboveit is the figure of the "bear and the hunter," already alluded to. 

 According to Judge Swan, the hunter Toivats on one occasion visited 

 the house of the King of the Bears, who was absent. His wife being 

 at home, he made love to her. When the bear returned he found his 

 wife in confusion and accused her of infidelity, but she denied it. She 

 went regularly to get wood and water, and the bear, still suspicious, 

 one day fastened a magic thread to her dress. On following it up he 

 found her in the arms of the hunter, whom he forthwith killed, as in 

 the pictograph. Whether or not this legend originated in the confusion 

 arising from a failure to distinguish between one of the bear totems 

 and a real bear, it is impossible to say, but for our purposes as a carv- 

 ing it illustrates three points: first, that as a legend it refers to the 

 bear totem ; second, that it warns wives to be faithful to their hus- 

 bands ; and third, it indicates a belief, on the part of these Indians, in 

 the possibility of human relations with animals, which, as shown in 

 Chapter iii must of necessity precede a belief in totemism itself. 



Above the "bear and hunter" is Tetl, the great raven, having in his 

 beak the new moon and in his claws the dish containing fresh water,, 

 illustrating the common and familiar legend of the creation : Tetl, the- 

 benefactor of man, stole from his evil uncle Kaunk,t the enemy of man,, 

 the new moon, Kung, which he had imprisoned in a box, and also got 

 fresh water by strategy from the daughter of Kaunk, to whom he made 

 love, and, deceiving her, stole a dish of fresh water and flew with it 

 out the smoke-hole of Kaunk's house. Above the raven are four disks 



* In the Kaigani dialect the brown bear is hoots ; wolf, howootz ; hawk, howot, and 

 hair seal, howoot. By inflection and aspiration these names are pronounced so dif- 

 ferently as to leave no room for mistaking on§ for another. The black bear is tan, 

 the same as in the Skidegate dialect of the Haida language. 



t By some Kaunk is identified with the eagle in the creation legend (Boas) and by 

 others with the wolf (Veniaminoflf). 



