99 
houses of logs similar in many respects to those inhabited by the 
Salish Indians of British Columbia. Every tribe of Eskimo moved 
at spring into rectangular or conical tents of skin that differed 
only in minor details from the tents of the Indians to the southward. 
None of the dwellings of the Canadian aborigines, not even the 
imposing houses of the British Columbia Indians, could compare in 
comfort with the homes of mediaeval Europe, still less with our 
homes of to-day. The Indians had no conception of hygiene; they 
seldom washed, unless for ceremonial reasons, and their homes were 
squalid and often filthy. Hotting meat and fish strewed the floors 
and ground outside; dogs, mice, and parasites of every kind shared 
the interior with its human inmates. Cooking utensils were invariably 
unclean ; “the more they are covered with thick grease, so much 
the better are they.’'^ The ventilation was inadequate; smoke 
pervadefl every corner, despite the hole in the roof, so that many 
natives incurred serious eye troubles, especially in their advancing 
years. Even the snow hut of the Eskimo, which was so fresh and 
clean when first erected, and which escaped the smoke through the 
substitution of a lamp for the open fire, became dingy within two 
or three days, its walls discoloured inside and out, its floor sodden 
with dripping meat and blubber, and its atmosphere tainted with 
the smell of burning seal-oil. Tribes that continually moved their 
camps had cleaner homes, but were no less unclean in their habits 
and persons. Privacy in home life was unknown ; a fellow tribesman 
could enter any dwelling without ceremony, even though it were 
occupied by a single family. The natives often performed most of 
their tasks, and ate their meals, outside their houses, if the weather 
permitted; and their dwellings were not so much homes in our 
conception of that term, as indispensable shelters against the elements. 
1 " Jesuit Relations,” vol. i, p. 285. 
