357 
snake. Neither carving nor painting attained a high level, but all 
five tribes inanufactiired splendid baskets decoratefl externally, by 
the peculiar process known as iinbrication, with geometric (and in 
modern times realistic) designs. The only other people in Canada 
who made comparable baskets were the Chilcotin and some bands 
of the Coast Salish, both of whom learned the art from the Interior 
Salish.^ 
For a period varying from one to four years after reaching^ 
maturity girls went into seclusion, and youths isolaterl themselves at 
Sunnner tent of Shiiswap Indians at Kamloops, (Photo hy courtesy of the 
American Museum of Natural History.) 
irregular intervals to obtain their guardian spirits. The marriage 
ceremony was a simple feast; men purchased their brides, and the 
women’s kinsmen repaid the husbands later. The dead were buried 
in the ground or under a rock slide.- Most tribes had first-fruit 
ceremonies to celebrate the ripening of various berries, and the arrival 
of the first shoal of salmon each season. The clans of the Lillooet 
and western Shuswap held masked dances during the winter, and 
their chiefs gave potlatches after the manner of the coast tribes. 
1 Liko tlie Uaida, llie Iiilorior Salisli (and also the Kootenay) cultivated tol>acco, or a tobacco-like 
plant, but instead of chewing it they smoked it in tubular pipes carved from .soapstone. 
2 The Sliuswap "bury them in large tombs which are of a conical form, aliout 20 feet diameter and 
composed of coarse timber." Journal of .Sinitm Fraser; in Masson, i, p. 167. 
