]80 
expounded by their medicine-lodge. But any chasm that existed was 
comparatively small, for the aborigines of Canada, even their 
medicine-men, seem to have been incapable of the flights of philo- 
sophical fancy that were so characteristic of the priesthoods in 
Polynesia. 
The secret societies of the Pacific coast w-ere primarily religious 
organizations, fraternities of initiates who, like the worshippers of 
Dionysos and Orpheus, had placed themselves under the patronage 
of certain supernatural powers. They retained this simple character 
when they spread to the natives in the interior of British Columbia, 
never attaining (at least among the Carriers) the tremendous social 
and political influence wdiich they exerted on the coast. During the 
winter festivals of the Kwakiutl and other southern tribes the mem- 
bers impersonated their patrons and deliberately deceived tlie unin- 
itiated, who firmly believed the grotescpie masked figures parading 
in their midst to be supernatural beings from above. But these 
western secret societies often restricted their membership to the 
upper classes; and they used their power for social purposes only, 
not for the moral or spiritual uplift of the people. So, although 
they stimulated the arts of sculpture and painting, they did not 
progress, like the mysteries of the Mediterranean wmrld, beyond the 
crude beliefs of the laity, or attain to any higher plane in either ethics 
or religion. 
In the weakly organized tribes of eastern and northern Canada 
the medicine-men always played a very important role, their influence 
depending solely on their individual personalities. A man of strong 
character could become both the spiritual and the political leader 
of his band, its buhvark against foes of the visible and of the invisible 
realm alike. But in the south and west, where the communities were 
more firmly knit together, the medicine-men as a class held a 
definitely subordinate place. The official heads of the tribal religions 
were not necessarily medicine-men at all, but leaders in the civil life. 
The Iroquois appointed special sacerdotal officers, “ Keepers of the 
Faith ”, to supervise all matters pertaining to religion and to offici- 
ate at festivals. On the plains any Indian of wealth and standing 
could acquire one of the coveted medicine-bundles, and the chief, 
not the medicine-men, regulated the time and place of the sun-dance. 
Among the Kwakiutl, Bella Coola, and other tribes of the Pacific 
