230 



SCIENCE. 



[Vol. YL, No. 136. 



correspond to the distribution of the moment. Nev- 

 ertheless, in a general way, the old maps, such as 

 that of 1877, still indicate the focus of the former 

 group or tribe, and doubtless will long continue to 

 do so. The Innuit tribes on the Kuskokwin have 

 been found by Nelson to extend farther up the river 

 than was supposed in 1877, reaching nearly or quite 

 to Kolmakoff's trading-post. The advance up the 

 Yukon, shown on the census map, is recent, if authen- 

 tic. The St. Lawrence Island people are more nearly 

 related to the Innuit of the American coast than to 

 those of Asia, though their commerce is with the lat- 

 ter and with their Korak neighbors. As regards the 

 Innuit of the region between the Koyukuk Pdver 

 and the Selawik Eiver, the miscegenation indicated 

 by the census map has no foundation in fact. The 

 error doubtless arose from the permission accorded 

 by the Innuit to special parties of Tinneh to come 

 into and through the territory of the former for 

 purposes of trade. The north shore of the penin- 

 sula east of Port Moller is represented by the census 

 map as occupied by the Aleuts or Unungiln. The 

 region is really not inhabited, except for a few tem- 

 porary hunting-stations, except by typical Innuit. 

 Notwithstanding these and many other errors in this 

 compilation, it is probably correct in extending the 

 area of Tinneh about Selawik Lake, which is a use- 

 ful addition to our knowledge. In 1880, while visiting 

 Cook's Inlet, I was enabled to determine the essen- 

 tial identity of the native Innuit of Kenai with those 

 of Prince William Sound, though among them were 

 many Konia'gmut, brought there for purposes of 

 trade in hunting the sea-otter. 



With regard to the Aleuts, the degree of civiliza- 

 tion to which they have attained is very promising. 

 The people are not scattered over the archipelago ex- 

 cept in their hunting-parties. In the western Aleu- 

 tian Islands the only permanent villages are at Attu 

 and Atka Islands. The division into groups is 

 rather a matter of tradition than of actuality: practi- 

 cally they are as much one people as those of two 

 adjacent English counties. 



The easternmost of the Innuit people are the Chu- 

 gachigmiit of Prince William Sound. At their east- 

 ern limit, there has long been a confusion, which I 

 supposed I had cleared up in 1874, but which has 

 only been finally regulated by information received 

 from the brothers Krause, and obtained by myself in 

 1880. The census agent who visited them in 1881 

 was frightened by some boisterous demonstrations, 

 and departed in the night in a small canoe, aban- 

 doning his equipage after a stay of some forty-eight 

 hours. Consequently very little information was ob- 

 tained by him, and that of an uncertain character. 



Three stocks approximate to each other at this 

 point, — the Chugachigmut Innuit, the Tinneh of 

 Copper River, and the Chilkaht tribe of Tlinkit. 

 The latter have a precarious trafiic coastwise, a 

 few canoes annually reaching the Chilkaht village 

 (sometimes called Chilkhaak) at Controller Bay by 

 the dangerous voyage from Yakutat. But another 

 path lies open to them, at least at times. One of Dr. 

 Krause's Indian guides informed him that he had 



descended the Altsekh River (a branch of the Atna, 

 or Copper River), which heads near the Chilkat 

 River at the head of Lynn Canal, to a village of his 

 own tribe at its mouth on the seacoast. Of the vis- 

 its of the Ah-tena tribe of the Tinneh I have had per- 

 sonal observation; and that the Chugachigmiit pass by 

 them to the Kayak Island in summer, all authorities 

 are agreed. This information explains the confusion 

 of previous evidence, and shows why the vocabula- 

 ries have sometimes afforded testimony in favor of 

 one view, and sometimes of another. A jargon is 

 probably in use in communications between the 

 Tlinkit and the Innuit. That any ethnic intermin- 

 gling of blood has taken place, I regard as too im- 

 probable to be worth consideration, having had per- 

 sonal evidence of the fear and hate existing between 

 the two peoples. There is some distrust bet,ween 

 the Tinneh and the Innuit, as elsewhere; but the 

 bold and aggressive Tlinkit have committed so many 

 outrages upon the timid and peaceable Chugachig- 

 mut, that the feeling there is of a much more bitter 

 character. 



I have elsewhere stated my reasons for believing 

 that the Innuit formerly extended much farther to 

 the south and east. Nothing has since been discov- 

 ered which materially affects the grounds of this be- 

 lief of mine, and the subject is an interesting one 

 for future investigation. 



PROCEEDINGS OF THE SECTION OF 

 ANTHROPOLOGY. 



The meetings of this section were held with great 

 regularity. The papers were all read on the days in- 

 dicated, and were most of them of great interest and 

 value, the hall assigned to the meetings being al- 

 ways filled with an interested audience. 



The first paper, by Rev. Mr. Dorsey, gave an ac- 

 count of a visit to the Siletz agency. The author had 

 spent several months at this agency, engaged chiefly 

 in linguistic studies. The agency is located near the 

 coast of Oregon, not far from the Columbia River. 

 The Indians at the agency are all of them more or 

 less civilized, and some of them take newspapers. In 

 complexion they are lighter than most Indians, and 

 are very short. The adult women, especially the 

 older ones, have the face disfigured by tattooed lines. 

 In many respects, both men and women resemble 

 the Ainos. In their treatment of strangers, the 

 Siletz Indians are very polite. The population of 

 the agency is made up by the consolidation of over 

 twenty tribes, none of whom are the original Siletz. 

 Because of this, the language spoken is a jargon. 

 The greater part of the paper consisted of a very 

 methodical and scholarly account of the peculi- 

 arities of this language. A few only of the charac- 

 teristics mentioned can be given. The verb varies 

 with the position of the object. They cannot say 

 ' that man,' but must say ' that man walking,' or sit- 

 ting, or standing, etc. There are three sets of car- 

 dinal numbers, human, inhuman, and inanimate. 

 Possessive endings are found in many words. All 



