412 NORTH AMERICAN INDIANS. 



According to Hall,* moreover, they are strictly honest among 

 themselves, kind, generous, and trustworthy. The Esqui- 

 maux women do not bear a high character. Both polygamy 

 and polyandry appear to occur. A strong or skilful man has 

 more than one wife, a beautiful or clever woman in some 

 cases more than one husband, f Again, the temporary loan 

 of a wife is considered a mark of peculiar friendship ; in 

 which, however, the advantage is not all on one side, as a 

 large family, far from being any incumbrance, is among the 

 Esquimaux a great advantage. J 



The North American Indians. 



The aboriginal, or at least the Precolumbian, inhabitants 

 of North America, fall naturally into three divisions. The 

 Esquimaux in the extreme north, the Indian tribes in the 

 centre, and the comparatively civilized Mexicans in the 

 south. The central tribes, which occupied by far the greater 

 extent of the continent, were again divided by the Rocky 

 Mountains into two great groups ; that on the western side 

 being in much the most abject condition. Though no doubt 

 there was and is an immense difference between different 

 tribes and particularly between the semi- agricultural na- 

 tions of the west and the filthy barbarians of North Cali- 

 fornia still Mr. Schoolcraft, to whom we are indebted for 

 an excellent work on the " History, Condition, and Prospects 

 of the Indian Tribes, " points out that " their manners and 

 customs, their opinions and mental habits, had, wherever they 

 were enquired into, at the earliest dates, much in common. 

 Their modes of war and worship, hunting and amusements, 

 were very similar. In the sacrifice of prisoners taken in 

 war ; in the laws of retaliation ; in the sacred character 



* I.e. vol. ii., p. 312. f Ross, I.e. p. 273. J Boss, I.e. p. 515. 



Published by authority of Congress. Philadelphia, 1853. 



