THE LOUCHEUX, OR KUTCHIN INDIANS. 



331 



CHAPTER XXXI. 



THE LOUCHEUX, OR KUTCHIN INDIANS. 



The Countries they inhabit. — Their Appearance and Dress. — Their Love of Finery.— Condition of the 

 Women. — Strange Customs.— Character. — Feuds with the Esquimaux. — Their suspicious and timo- 

 rous Lives. — Pounds for catching Reindeer. — Their Lodges. 



O^^" the banks of the Lower Mackenzie, to the west of Great Bear Lake, in 

 the territories drained by the Peel River and by the Upper Yukon, 

 dwell the Loucheux, or Kutchin Indians, whose language is totally different 

 from that of the other North American tribes, and whose customs and manners 

 also vary considerably from those of all their neighbors, both Red-skins and 

 Esquimaux. 



They are an athletic and fine-looking people, with regular features and a 

 complexion of a lighter copper color than that of the other Red Indians, so that 

 many of their women would be reckoned handsome in any country. The fe- 

 males tattoo their chins and use a black pigment when they paint their faces, 

 while the men employ both red and black on all occasions of ceremony, and al- 

 ways to be ready, each carries a small bag with red clay and black lead suspend- 

 ed to his neck. Most commonly the eyes are encircled with black, a stripe of 

 the same runs down the middle of the nose, and a blotch is daubed on the upper 

 part of each cheek. The forehead is crossed by many narrow red stripes, and 

 the skin is streaked alternately with red and black. 



The outer shirt of the Kutchin is made of the skins of fawn reindeer, dress- 

 ed with the hair on after the manner of the Hare, Dog-rib, and other Chepe- 

 wyan tribes, but resembles in form the analogous garment of the Esquimaux, 

 being furnished with peaked skirts, though of smaller size. The men wear 

 these skirts before and behind ; the women have larger back skirts, but none in 

 front. In winter shirts of hare-skin are worn, and the pantaloons of deer-skin 

 have the fur next the skin. 



None of the neighboring nations pay so much attention to personal cleanli- 

 ness, or are so studious in adorning their persons. A broad band of beads is 

 worn across the shoulders and breast of the shirt, and the hinder part of the 

 dress is fringed with tassels wound round with dyed porcupine quills and strung 

 with the silvery fruit of the oleaster {Elceagnus argentea) ; a stripe of beads, 

 strung in alternate red and white squares, ornament the seams of the trowsers, 

 and bands of beads encircle the ankles. The poorer sort, or the less fortunate 

 hunters, who are unable to procure these costly trinkets in the same enviable 

 abundance as the rich, strive to wear at least a string of beads, and look down 

 with contemptuous pity upon the still more needy class, which is reduced to 

 adorn itself with porcupine quills only. 



In consequence of this passionate fondness for beads, these ornaments serve 



