211 
•rliffcrentiate one animal from another. Ears placed in line with the 
eyes denote a human beinj*;, ears situated above the head an animal. 
A lon^*; tongue protruding from the mouth connotes a grizzly bear, 
•even though the rest of the figure is human, and by the same con- 
v'ention two large incisor teeth and a squamous tail denote a beaver. 
62244 
A painted wall-board that w.is used as a sliding partition in a Tsinisliian initiation 
ceremony. Tlie de.sign is snppo.sed to represent a woodpecker. (Photo hy 
Xdtional Museum of Canada.) 
This extraordinary style of art varies slightly from tribe to tribe 
along the coast so that we can usually distinguish without difficulty 
the productions of the southern peoples, the Coast Salish and the 
Kwakiutl, from those of the Haida and Tsimshian in the north. ^ 
The differences, however, are of a somewhat minor character and 
need not detain us here. In every district the art was both highly 
conventionalized and highly symbolic, the figures rejiresenting defi- 
nite characters drawn from the local traditions and myths. 
We may admire the artists’ control of their technique, 
the excellence of many of their carvings, and the splen- 
didly decorative effect of some of the paintings. The huge 
totem-poles and house-posts will impress us by their savage dignity; 
silver bracelets and slate dishes delight us by the delicacy of their 
engravings. But the grotesqueness of the figures, unredeemed, as in 
the art of the New Zealand Maoris, by exquisite scrollwork or other 
softening features, .soon wearies us; and the conventionalization is 
1 C7. Boas, F.: “Primitive Art,” p, 287 et acq. (Oslo, 1927). 
