Chapter VII: The Aborigines (1)

At the time the Western Hemisphere became known to Europeans, as has been shown by subsequent explorations, it was inhabited by native tribes from the Atlantic to the Pacific and from the extreme north to Patagonia. The aborigines were distributed principally along the coast, about the borders of lakes, and on the margins of streams, but much of the interior was also inhabited or roamed over by hunting and war parties, or crossed by various tribes during their migrations. Large areas, it is true, more especially among the rugged mountains, in the great subarctic forest, and on the trackless tundras, had no permanent residents, but in general terms the entire land was inhabited.

In spite of the reports as to the density of the aboriginal population made by several early explorers, who for the most part followed the waterways, visited the most thickly inhabited regions, and saw the natives when brought together by motives of curiosity or defence, it is now known that North America, considering its vast extent, was but sparsely peopled. As to the number of the inhabitants, there is no even approximately accurate knowledge. The greatest density of population, so far as can be judged, was in the tropical region, and decreased northward in a general way in conformity with change in latitude, but varied also in a conspicuous manner in accord with local climatic and topographic influences.

In the same manner as the exploration of the New World led to the discovery of many species, genera, etc., of plants and animals, it also added two types of man to those previously known to Europeans. The propriety of separating the American aborigines into two groups of tribes is based on the contrasts the members of these divisions present not only in colour and other physiological characteristics, but on well-marked differences in language, customs, arts, etc. On this basis two varieties of the human species have been recognised, namely, the Eskimo and the Indian.

The term Eskimo, formerly spelled Esquimau, is of obscure origin, but is thought to have been adopted by Europeans from the Indians of Labrador, who thus designated a northern people living on the coast, and is said to mean "raw-flesh eaters." The word in use among the Eskimos to designate themselves is _Innuit_, meaning people, or the people, in the sense that in their own estimation they are of more importance than all other peoples.

The term Indian, as is well known, arose from an error of the early Spanish voyagers, who, on arriving in America, believed they had reached India, and hence termed the natives of the new land Indians. This mistake has led to many attempts to substitute some other word by which to designate the people referred to, but thus far none of the terms proposed has been generally accepted. In the present book the word Indian is used to designate the aborigines of the New World, exclusive of the Eskimos.

The geographical distribution of the Eskimos and Indians is sharply defined even at the present day, and is indicated on the map forming Plate VI.

_Origin of the Aborigines._--The generally accepted conclusion in reference to the origin of the American aborigines seems to be that man reached this continent while the peoples of the Old World were yet in a primitive condition, and at a time when the highest stage of culture was expressed by the knife and spear-point of chipped stone, and developed independently in accord with the natural conditions with which he was surrounded. More than this, once planted, the original stock received but slight if any accessions by subsequent immigration. This last statement is not in strict accord with the conclusions reached by certain ethnologists, who claim that the use of masks, the art of carving on wood, stone, ivory, etc., the practise of tattooing, the preservation of human heads, and other customs practised by the Indians of the Pacific coast of the two Americas--and in North America, extending eastward along lines of easiest communication--suggest an influence coming from Polynesia at a time when the peoples dwelling on the west borders of the Pacific had made a well-marked advance in culture. Some influences on the aborigines of America coming both from Polynesia and eastern Asia must seemingly be admitted, the importations having been by means of storm- and current-swept boats and junks, but the evidence does not point to trade relations. The most that can be claimed seems to be slight modifications of the arts and customs of the American aborigines, but not enough to make what may be termed an indelible impression upon them.

The low state of culture of the original stock from which the American aborigines were derived, implied in their distinct subsequent development in language, arts, etc., indicates that man appeared in America previous to the invention of boats capable of crossing broad oceans. The necessary inference from this--if the hypothesis of one place of origin for the human race is accepted--is that migration to America was by land, or at most across narrow straits. The geography of the continents must have been markedly different from what it is at present to admit of this, providing the proof that access was not gained where Asia and America make a near approach to each other at Bering Strait is conclusive, and at present that evidence seems unquestionable.

The present state of opinion in reference to the origin of the American aborigines is thus expressed by one well qualified to speak with authority. At the close of a review of several lines of evidence J. W. Powell says:

"Thus we are forced to conclude that the occupancy of America by mankind was anterior to the development of arts, industries, institutions, languages, and opinions; that the primordial occupancy of the continent antedates present geographical conditions, and points to a remote time which can be discovered only on geological and biological investigation."

_Antiquity of the Aborigines._--The conclusions to be drawn from the studies of ethnologists in reference to the length of time man has made his home in America are qualitative, not quantitative. The time is certainly long, probably embracing tens of centuries; but how long no one can state in years. This claim for a great although indefinite antiquity is based on several lines of evidence, some few of which the reader may find it profitable to briefly consider.

A comparison of physiological characteristics shows that the American aborigines have well-marked differences from all other varieties of the human race. This conclusion is not based on any one special feature, although colour and character of the hair are the most conspicuous, but on the resultant, so to speak, of many attributes. It is, in a measure, a comparison of ideal type-examples of each variety. While each characteristic that may be chosen has individual and tribal variations, and but few of them are perhaps conspicuously different from those pertaining to the peoples of the Old World, yet taken together they clearly differentiate the American aborigines from all other varieties of the human species.

Applying the same principles to man that are used in the study of the geographical distribution of the lower animals, the only legitimate conclusion the naturalist can deduce from the evidence just referred to is that the branch of the human family indigenous to North America has been isolated for a sufficient length of time to develop into a new variety. The American aborigines are different from all other varieties of the human species because each more or less isolated community or group of communities the world over has varied in its own way in accord with climatic and other conditions, and the connecting links have been lost. The differences that have arisen in this manner are so great that the nature of the parent stock is no longer determinable from its living representatives. This process of development among the lower animals is understood to involve a great length of time; and the inference is that man's development is no exception to the rule.

The evidence favouring a great antiquity for the American aborigines is strengthened by the fact that when first known to Europeans both North and South America were inhabited by tribes having more or less well-defined territorial limits. If this population spread from one or even from several centres it is evident that a great length of time would be required for it to reach all parts of the New World and to become adjusted to a wide range in climatic and other conditions, as is known to be the case.

Students of languages have shown that the most enduring characteristics of man are to be found in his speech. The fundamental principles of a language outlive not only political and social changes, but even physiological distinctions, and are inherited from a primitive stock by all its branches. We might reasonably expect, therefore, that a study of the languages spoken in America in pre-Columbian days would be a sure index as to the primitive stock from which the various tribes came, and show to which of the many other branches of the linguistic tree they are most closely related. Turning with this question to those who have made a critical study of the languages of the American aborigines, and no one is better qualified to bear testimony in this connection than J. W. Powell, the honoured director of the American Bureau of Ethnology, we find a definite answer. He says:

"The North American Indian tribes, instead of speaking related dialects, originating in a single parent language, in reality speak many languages, belonging to distinct families, which have no apparent unity of origin."

To the north of Mexico (Plate VI) the aborigines are divided into 58 linguistic families. In a large portion of these languages there are tribal dialects not understood by members of other tribes of the same family. Thus the Algonquin linguistic family contains some 30 or 40 distinct languages. In the Athapascan the diversity is nearly as great. The smaller families present similar conditions in proportionate degree, although there are stocks which speak but one language. Four of the linguistic families referred to extend into Mexico, but to the south of the territory occupied by them other languages and dialects are spoken. Ethnologists who have studied the tribes of Mexico report 19 linguistic stocks, containing 108 distinct languages, among which there are upward of 60 dialects. In Central America a similar diversity in the native tongues exists. Reclus, in his great work The Earth and its Inhabitants, states that in the New World 450 native languages are spoken--a number greater than that of all the languages in use in the rest of the earth. Not only are the American linguistic stocks different from each other, and fail to furnish evidence of having been derived from a single parent tongue, but, as philologists assure us, no one of them is analogous to any language spoken in other lands.

As is well known, a language is not created _de novo_, but by a slow process of development. Since the first acquirement of articulate speech by man a succession of languages has appeared owing to the growth, differentiation, etc., of pre-existing forms of speech. It is a warrantable inference, therefore, that the marvellous diversity in speech present in America could only have arisen by a process of evolution involving a very long period of time.

As the American languages have no affinity with the Teutonic or Semitic stocks, it is evident that the source or sources from which they came far antedate the birth of the oldest people of which history takes cognizance. Man must therefore have set foot on American soil before the sprouting of the linguistic twig which, after millenniums, produced the cuneiform inscriptions of ancient Persia and Assyria.

The diversity of arts, customs, myths, religions, etc., among the American aborigines, and their difference in nearly all instances from the analogous attributes of the peoples of other lands, also point to a long period of isolated development in much the same manner as has been referred to in the case of a comparative study of their languages. The skin boats used by the Eskimos are widely different from the birch-bark canoes of the Algonquins, and these again differ conspicuously from the dug-out canoes of southeastern Alaska and British Columbia; still other varieties of boats are peculiar to the more southern Indian tribes, and all alike differ from the boats used in other lands. Like individuality pertains also to the houses of the American aborigines, their clothing, arms, utensils, basket-work, picture-writings, etc. One is forced to recognise in each of these arts or industries not only development in many diverging lines among the various tribes, but the birth of ideas analogous to those which arose in other lands, and their independent growth under special conditions. All of this, and much more in the same general direction that might be discussed did space permit, points to a great antiquity for the indigenous American peoples.

Among the nations of the Old World certain plants have been under domestication for so long a time, and have varied so greatly, that the wild species from which they came are no longer known. This is true of nearly all our common fruits and vegetables and many of our flowers that were derived from the Old World. At the time of the Spanish conquest the aborigines of America were cultivating tobacco, potatoes, beans, tomatoes, squashes, maize, cotton, etc., and in the case of most of these plants the wild species from which they were derived has not been ascertained. The argument that points to a great antiquity in the case of wheat and the peach applies equally well to tobacco and maize, and indicates that horticulture began in America in remote antiquity. At the time of Columbus, the ox, sheep, goat, pigeons, fowls, cat, etc., long domesticated in the Old, were absent in the New World, and the llama, turkey, etc., indigenous in America, were unknown in Europe. These striking differences, among which there is not even a single exception, amount to positive evidence that contact between the peoples of the Old and the New World did not occur after the inhabitants of the former emerged from savagery, or, what is the same thing, never existed in the sense that trade relations were entered into. This same line of argument seemingly casts grave doubts on the deductions already referred to concerning the importation into America from Polynesia of the practise of tattooing, the wearing of masks, the use of labrets, etc.; and indicates also that but slight changes were produced in the American aborigines owing to the wrecking of Asiatic junks on the northwest coast.

Another factor bearing on the antiquity of the indigenous Americans is the stage of development reached in spite of their long and nearly complete isolation. Stimuli from without, and particularly contact with more advanced peoples, having been lacking or of small importance, incentive to bodily and mental activity arose mainly from the desire for food, clothing, and shelter, and from intertribal rivalry, jealousy, and war. This process of indigenous development was certainly slow. With man, as with the lower animals, the rate of advance and of specialization increases as higher and higher grades of development are reached. For the American aborigines to have attained the higher stages of barbarism at the time of the arrival of civilized Europeans, solely by self-growth and self-education, is perhaps even a stronger argument for their antiquity than their differentiation in culture, languages, etc.

These several lines of evidence point to the coming of man to America as an event of the far distant past--a time so remote, in fact, that it pertains to geology rather than to ethnology.

Turning to the geological records, we find no authentic and well-attested evidence of the presence of man in America either previous or during the Glacial period. From time to time so-called "finds" of stone implements in gravel and other deposits more or less definitely determined to be of Glacial age have been made, but in all of these instances convincing proof as to the age of the deposits, or of the relation of the implements in question, to them, has not been presented. Certain discoveries of the bones of men and of articles of human manufacture found in California have been claimed to be of Tertiary age--that is, much older than the Glacial epoch--but more critical studies, especially by W. H. Holmes, have shown that they are decidedly modern and pertain to the Indians still living in the region where they were found. In brief, all the geological evidence thus far gathered bearing on the antiquity of man in America points to the conclusion that he came after the Glacial epoch. Judgment in this respect, however, should be held in abeyance, as the search for evidence is as yet incomplete.

As the problem now stands, the origin of the American aborigines is not only unknown, but no generally accepted or fairly promising hypothesis as to the land from which they came, the route followed, or the date of their arrival is to be found among the large number suggested. A continuation of the critical, ethnological, and geological studies now in progress, it is hoped, will do much to clear away this mystery, but at present only small progress can be truthfully reported.

_Culture of the Aborigines._--In the classification of peoples in terms of culture three main divisions are commonly recognised, namely, _savagery_, _barbarism_, and _civilization_; but the boundaries between these divisions are not sharply defined and a wide range of intermediate gradations is easily discernible.

By savagery is understood the lowest grade of culture and of ethics, in which social customs are lax or wanting and tribal organization not attempted. In the condition of savagery people are without permanent homes, do not attempt agriculture or even horticulture, have no domesticated animals except perhaps the dog, and subsist on fish and game, including molluscs, small mammals, and reptiles, and such seeds, fruits, nuts, etc., as wild plants supply. The art of kindling fire is probably known to all existing savages, but much of their food is eaten uncooked.

In the state of barbarism tribal organization may exist; some form of religion is usually recognised; definite marriage relations are entered into, although polygamy is commonly practised; permanent houses, perhaps for winter use only, are built; clothes are made from woven cloth as well as from skins; the plaiting of baskets and the art of making coarse pottery, frequently highly decorated, are understood; essentially all utensils, arms, etc., are of stone, wood, bone, or ivory, the metals other than those occurring in a native state being unknown; and writing is unknown, although pictographs may be employed.

Civilization implies a well-marked development in ethics, laws, social organization, institutions, arts, writing, etc.

Under this scheme of classification various divisions of the aborigines of North America at the time of the coming of Columbus occupied each of the planes of development designated; but those frequently classed as civilized had not arrived at an advanced stage of culture, and can perhaps with greater propriety be designated as semicivilized, or, better still, be referred to the highest stage of barbarism.

Some of the native tribes, as those of southern California and certain of the peoples of Mexico and Central America, were in a state of savagery, and, in fact, have not advanced beyond that state at the present day. A large majority of the aborigines, as, for example, the Algonquins, Shoshoneans, etc., or, in general, all of the Indians to the northward of Arizona and New Mexico, together with certain of the tribes to the south of that boundary, had definite tribal organization, permanent homes at least for winter use, in part practised horticulture, and for these and other reasons are to be classed as in the barbarous stage of development. The Aztecs, Mayas, etc., of Mexico and Central America had well-established governments, built permanent and frequently large and elaborately decorated houses, some of which were of hewn stone, practised horticulture with the aid of irrigation, had developed a system of picture-writing, and were skilled in working native metals. These and other advances towards civilization were great and promising, but the use of iron was unknown, and their practice of human sacrifice and the absence of phonetic writing denies them a place among truly civilized peoples.

Another scheme for the classification of peoples in terms of the highest grade of implements used by them is current under which they are placed in certain ages on the assumption that man in all regions has passed through an orderly sequence in his development, and that the successive changes are expressed by the nature of the material used in the manufacture of implements. Under this plan of classification we have an age of stone, an age of bronze, and an age of iron. The stone age is commonly divided into two parts: an earlier or _paleolithic_, during which the highest type of implement used is fashioned of stone by chipping; and a later, or _neolithic_, when implements of stone are shaped by grinding and polishing. Following the stone age came one of bronze, when a mixture of copper and tin was used for implements; and later the age of iron, beginning when the art of reducing metals from their ores was discovered. In this scheme a copper age is sometimes included, with doubtful propriety, however, if, as in America, the metal referred to is obtained in its native condition.

Under the somewhat indefinite scheme of classification just referred to the North American aborigines, inclusive of the Aztecs, etc., previous to the coming of European civilization were in the stone age of development, although bronze was in use among the Incas of Peru, and to some extent had found its way northward as far as Mexico. Certain of the tribes still used implements of chipped stone, but in the great majority of instances implements of polished stone were the highest type known. Native copper was widely used for axes, knives, ornaments, etc., but iron, except such as occurs in meteors, was unknown.

The difficulty met with in selecting any one article or any one material used by primitive peoples as a basis for their classification is illustrated by the facts just cited, as it places the lowest savage of America in the same group as the Aztec and the Maya. Obviously, in the classification of peoples as with the lower animals all characteristics should be included.

THE ESKIMOS

The extreme northern part of North America is included in the circumpolar lands described in another volume of the series of which the present book forms a part, and the Eskimos as a people will therefore receive but passing attention at this time.

One of the most interesting facts to the geographer concerning the Eskimos is their peculiar distribution. From choice or necessity they make their homes on the bleak, inhospitable northern border of the continent, and do not extend inland except where the coast is indented or large rivers enter the sea. In all localities their dwellings are near the water. They are the most northern people on the earth, and their still greater northward extension is checked only by the absence of land on which to build their winter homes. Their present inland limit on the continent is no doubt determined in part by long-established custom and by the distribution of the animals on which they have become dependent for food, clothing, fuel, etc., but the chief control formerly, no doubt, more potent than at present, is to be sought in the aggressiveness of the Indians. In Greenland, the arctic archipelago, and throughout the immense extent of coast-lands from Labrador to Alaska they have been isolated and withdrawn from contact with other peoples for a long period of time, and their slow development unmodified by extraneous influences. In Newfoundland and Alaska, however, they have been in contact with the Indians, trade relations established, and to a limited extent an interchange of ideas as well as some intermarriage has taken place.

Throughout the vast extent of arctic coast between Newfoundland and Alaska, as well as in Greenland and on the islands of the arctic archipelago, the Eskimo was the sole inhabitant before the coming of Europeans, and one language current from the Atlantic to the Pacific. No other primitive people has such an extent in longitude. The reason for this peculiarity is that between the sea margin, where the Eskimo makes his home, and the southern border of the subarctic forest and adjacent prairies, where the Indians have their hunting-grounds, there intervenes the tundra--a neutral ground attractive neither to the Eskimo nor the Indian.

The one thing which more than all else has enabled the Eskimo to maintain an existence and to thrive in the frozen north is his discovery of a means of obtaining heat and light where wood is scarce--that is, the invention of the lamp. This invention, as has been shown by Walter Hugh and others, was favoured by the occurrence in the far north of animals like the seal and walrus, which yield oil with a high heat-giving property.

In Alaska the Eskimo stock is broken into several tribes speaking diverse dialects. Of these, two main subgroups are distinguished, namely, Innuits and Aleuts or Aleutians. The former includes several tribes living on the margin of the mainland, from near Mount St. Elias northward to the Arctic Ocean, and the latter consists of but two tribes, now intermingled, which at the time of the discovery of the Alaskan region by the Russians inhabited the western portion of the Alaskan peninsula and the Aleutian Islands. A detailed account of these peoples should have united with it a study of the so-called Tuski of northeastern Siberia, who are of the same stock, and, as seems probable, are the descendants of Eskimos who migrated from America to Asia.

_The Innuits._--This name, as is stated by W. H. Dall, is applied to themselves by all the tribes of the Eskimo stock, except the Aleuts and the eastern Siberian natives. It is in use at the present time from Greenland to Bering Strait, and thence southward to the vicinity of Mount St. Elias.

In Alaska the Innuits are divided into at least fourteen tribes, speaking as many different dialects, and distinguished by such names as Ugalakmuts, Kaniagmuts, etc. The termination _mut_, in a substantive sense, means a village at the place or on the river to the name of which it is added (Dall). In common with all other Eskimo tribes the Innuits are a sturdy, well-built people, having lighter-coloured skins than the Indians, and more nearly approaching the yellow of the Asiatics, but distinct from it, and in many instances having a decided reddish tinge to the cheeks. The prevalent idea that the Eskimo is of decidedly short stature is not borne out by the various tribes in Alaska, who are not much, if any, below the average height of Europeans. Their rotund bodies and full, round faces, in which the organ answering to a nose is depressed until between the eyes it is scarcely distinguishable, suggest that the severity of the climate has led to a development of fat for protection against cold in the same manner as among the seals and walruses. Such a generalization is perhaps misleading, as great individual variations occur as among all peoples, but the typical Innuit whose figure remains in one's memory when the bony hags, the cadaverous individuals, and the aged are forgotten or but dimly recalled, favours the conventional pictures of Santa Claus, with a face resembling the full moon, small black eyes with a suggestion of obliquity in their alignment, and nearly complete absence of a beard on the ruddy cheeks.

The food of the Eskimos of Alaska, as is the case with all other divisions of that people, is derived mainly from the sea. Their diet is almost exclusively fish, the blubber and flesh of the seal, walrus, and whales, especially the white whale or beluga, which ascends the larger streams. To these sources of supply are added the arctic hare, caribou (reindeer), and in fact any flesh that can be obtained. Vegetable diet is almost unknown, except so far as it is supplied by the berries that grow in profusion on the tundras. The necessity for salt, so marked in the case of most peoples, is absent in the far north.

The coast of Alaska, where dwells the Innuit, is treeless. Inland from the margin of the sea extends the permanently frozen tundra. Wood for fires, sleds, frames for skin boats, spears, bows, arrows, etc., and in prehistoric time for producing fire by friction, is derived entirely from driftwood cast on the beach by the waves. This wood, consisting in many instances of great tree trunks from which planks two or more feet wide can be hewn, is brought to the sea by rivers heading far inland, as, for example, the Yukon and the Kuskokwim, and distributed by the wind and currents all about the coast and islands of Bering Sea. Driftwood is also carried to the Arctic Ocean by the Mackenzie, but in general is not plentiful on the borders of the ice-bound northern ocean.

The houses of the Alaskan Innuit previous to the coming of the Russians, and still to a great extent, consist of a single room, usually measuring about 10 by 14 feet, situated in part below the surface of the ground and entered by means of a tunnel-like passageway. They are made of driftwood, and floored, lined, and roofed with planks hewn from the same material. On a roof of poles sods and earth are placed and rendered compact by stamping, thus forming a cover which serves to exclude water produced by the melting of the naturally added layer of snow. When spring-time approaches these partially subterranean winter dwellings are liable to be inundated, and are abandoned and tents used during summer seasons. Formerly these tents were made of skins of caribou or seal, but in these degenerate days cotton drilling bought of white traders has been substituted. During winter journeys temporary snow huts are built, of the oval, bake-oven shape, well known to most Europeans from the many pictures that have been published of similar structures made by the more northern Eskimos. On the coast of Alaska, however, when driftwood is available, the roofs of the snow houses are frequently made of poles on which snow is piled.

In addition to the ordinary winter dwellings, which are usually occupied by two or more families, each village is commonly supplied with an assembly house or _casine_ (a word of Russian origin), which serves also as a bath-house, and in them winter dances, the chief amusement of the people, are held. The casine, built by the united efforts of the various members of a community, consist of a single room, in part underground and entered by a tunnel, which frequently measures some 25 by 30 feet on the sides, and is approximately 15 feet high. They are substantially made of logs or of thick planks hewn with much labour from stranded tree trunks. The roof is of logs covered with moss and earth, and has an opening in the centre for the escape of smoke from the fire kindled on a hearth in the centre of the floor. When the fire is not burning, the opening in the roof is closed with a membrane obtained from the intestines of the seal. About the sides of the room there is a raised platform for spectators during dances and for the use of bathers when the customary steam-baths are indulged in. An interesting fact in connection with both the ordinary winter homes and the casines, which indicates their American origin, is that they are communal. A tenement used by several families in common is characteristic of the American aborigines from the arctic to Panama.

The architecture of the Innuits has been modified but little during recent years, except that in localities most visited by white men and where trading stations have been established, as at St. Michael, log-houses built after the manner of those used by the Russian residents have to a considerable extent replaced the native huts, with favourable results so far as sanitary conditions are concerned. The Russian log-house is not unlike the many similar structures still to be seen in portions of Canada and the United States, except that the upper side of each log is hewn so as to have a sharp edge, which fits into a deep groove, cut in the log which rests on it. Moss is placed between the logs, and is also used to fill all holes and crevices. Air is usually admitted through a pipe situated beneath the floor and opening in front of the stove, if one is used, and a small pipe for ventilation passes out through the roof. In the Russian houses the stove is usually a huge affair, made of large flat stones, which retain heat for a long time.

The dress of the Innuits in former days, in common with all the Eskimo tribes, consisted of skins, and in special cases of the intestines of seals. The characteristic garment is the parkie or overshirt, not open in front, however, provided with a hood and made of caribou skin tanned with the hair on. Those worn by men have a different cut than those intended for women. In recent years, and perhaps before the coming of white men, the skins for the manufacture of parkies were derived largely by trade from the people owning domesticated reindeer in Asia. The margin of the hood is commonly made of wolf skins, the long hair of which, blowing across the face, affords much protection. Trousers and boots made of the skin of the hair-seal or moccasins shaped from the skin of the leg of a caribou completed the dress. Mats of grass are worn in the boots or moccasins during cold weather. At the present time the summer clothing of the natives throughout Alaska is generally of cloth obtained from white traders, but nothing brought from more civilized countries can replace the parkies, fur trousers, skin boots, and waterproof shirts or _kamlaykas_. These articles, except the last mentioned, are largely used by white men, especially if making winter journeys.

The boats in use among the Innuits are still the _kayak_ and the _oomiak_, for which civilized man can offer no adequate substitute. The well-known kayak, made of a light framework of wood, tied with thongs, over which is tightly stretched a dressed sealskin covering, leaving only one or two circular openings for the occupant, is in use from Greenland all about the arctic coast of America to Asia. Different shapes pertain to different tribes. In recent years, as a result of outside influence, openings for three occupants are sometimes made, the size of the boat also being increased. To one familiar with boat and canoe travel these light skin craft, with their water-tight decks, seem the perfection of boat construction. The occupant lashes the skirt of his kamlayka about the raised rim of the opening in which he sits and the boat is thus rendered impervious to water from whatever direction. The greatest danger is that the parchment-like covering may be ruptured, as by the cutting edge of thin ice. To ordinary storms, however, they are more safe than even the deservedly celebrated "whale-boat" of the white man. The oomiak, or woman's boat, also made of dressed skin stretched over a frame, is much larger than the kayak, has a flat bottom, is without deck covering, and designed for the use of many occupants. As is well known, boats of each of these types are propelled by means of paddles. Both the kayak and oomiak are still in every-day use, and it is to be hoped the boats of the white man will never wholly replace them.

The changes in house-building and dress referred to, which have come from contact with white men, are outward signs of a great modification in the lives of the Innuits, which began in the early days of Russian occupation and has continued with increasing importance to the present time. The natives are quick to imitate the customs of the strangers who have visited them, and but for the restraint that the climatic conditions have put upon them and the high price in furs demanded by traders for imported goods the changes thus produced would be far more marked than is now the case. To some extent the food of the natives has been modified, flour being in demand, but, with minor exceptions, the principal articles consumed are still such as are obtained by hunting and fishing.

The greatest change that has taken place in the condition of the Alaskan Innuits, and one which, perhaps, culminated at the time of the recent "gold excitement" on the Yukon and at Cape Nome, is in relation to the introduction of intoxicating liquors and of certain contagious diseases. These scourges, coming from the south, have been almost as great a blight among the native peoples as would be the sweeping southward of a wave of arctic temperature to the vegetation of tropical lands. The _curse of contact_, resulting when a civilized race invades a land inhabited by childlike aborigines, as has been seen in many parts of the world, has overtaken the Innuits in common with nearly all other tribes in Alaska, and decadence and the prolongation of a miserable existence, unless cut short by extermination through starvation, is all that seemingly can be hoped for.

The fur-bearing animals of Alaska have been greatly reduced in numbers during the last twenty-five years: the caribou and the moose have, to a marked degree, been killed or driven to remote regions; the larger whales, on account of overcapture by American whalers, have become scarce; the sea-lion and the walrus are nearly extinct; the fur-seal, of more importance to the Aleutians than the Innuits, is rapidly approaching extinction. Thus in many ways the food supply is greatly decreased. Recourse to agriculture is impossible. The one redeeming feature of the white man's aggression is the introduction of the domesticated reindeer from Asia and Lapland. With reindeer, the salmon, not as yet depleted in the streams emptying into Bering Sea, the white whale, the hair-seal, not as yet of commercial value, the countless birds of summer, the berries of the tundra, etc., the Innuits can survive, maintain their manhood, and become useful to civilization in certain ways if the curse of drink and the spread of imported diseases could be stopped. Such a change, however, for various reasons, is not to be hoped for. It may perhaps be said that the influence of missionaries, and, what is vastly more important, the work of the school-teacher, has opened to these children of the cold northern land a way to civilization, but the results up to the present time are not reassuring.

The census of 1890 showed that the Innuits of Alaska numbered 13,045. In the census of 1900 a separate enumeration of Eskimos and Indians was not made.

The dismal picture I have been compelled to sketch of the present condition and future prospects of the Innuits of Alaska, in order to indicate their status at the opening of the twentieth century, applies also with variations in detail and some hopeful signs to a large majority of the other aboriginal tribes of North America.

_The Aleutians._--The aboriginal inhabitants of the Aleutian Islands are termed Aleuts or Aleutians, a word of obscure and perhaps foreign derivation. As stated above, they belong to the Eskimo family, but are more widely separated from the parent stock than any other of its constituent tribes. Evidence advanced by W. H. Dall tends to show that they are of American continental origin. At the time of the first coming of the Russians, about 1750, they were at war with the Kaniagmuts, who inhabited the greater part of the Alaskan peninsula and were the nearest tribe of the Innuits.

When discovered by the Russians the Aleuts were an active, sprightly people, fond of the dance and of festivities. They are of lighter colour, but not perhaps in general more nearly white than the full-blooded Innuits. At present it is difficult to find even a single representative of unmixed descent, Russian occupation having stamped out or greatly modified nearly every native characteristic both of body and mind. They were originally a robust people, of about the average height found in civilized countries, with coarse black hair and scanty beards. Their island life, where no large game invited inland journeys, made them emphatically "canoe people." The habit of sitting in their kayaks and using the muscles of the upper portion of the body in paddling, throwing the spear, etc., while the lower portion of the body received but little exercise, led to a fine chest development and to undersized and comparatively weak legs. The women, to whom the use of the kayak was not intrusted, were better proportioned than the men, and many of them are pleasing in appearance. As stated by Dall, they were less determined than their neighbours on the mainland, the Kaniagmuts, but were by no means devoid of courage. Their mode of worship partook more of the character of a religion than that of any other of the Eskimo tribes in their native condition.

From what can be learned of the Aleuts in their uncontaminated native state, they seem to have been the most intelligent of all the Eskimo tribes and the one which gave the greatest promise, if treated humanely, of advancement when civilization was introduced. Less than a century of contact with Russian invaders, however, led to a depth of degradation that is only paralleled and possibly not exceeded by the shameful results of the Spanish invasion among the aborigines of the West Indies. One of the darkest chapters in American history, fortunately for the credit of Europeans now largely lost, is that containing an account of the brutal treatment the Aleuts received at the hands of the Russians. The childlike natives became worse than slaves. The debauchery of their oppressors was shameful. As stated by Dall, "the Aleuts were subjected to the most horrible outrages. The names of Glottoff and Solovioff (two Russian explorers, 1764-'65) make them shudder to this day. Thousands perished under sword and fire. Long after those enormities were checked the Russians considered the Aleuts as beasts rather than men," etc. Their numbers, estimated at 10,000 in 1799, were, according to a Russian census, reduced to 5,238 in 1808, and, as stated by Dall, numbered not more than 1,500 in 1870. The census of 1890 gives it as 967.

The incentive to Russian oppression was the greed for furs and the lust of rude men at a distance from all centres of control. The Aleutian Islands and neighbouring waters is the home of the sea-otter, which is clothed with the most beautiful of all furs. Near at hand are the Pribilof Islands, to which the fur-seal formerly resorted each summer in countless numbers, and during its migrations traversed the passes separating the islands of the Aleutian chain, where they were easily taken; the commercial value of their skins previous to about 1867, however, was small. In addition, the land-otter and several species of foxes also inhabited the same region. These allurements tempted the Russians, and besides the Aleutian Islands, with their sheltered harbours, furnished favourable stations from which to extend the fur trade into the still greater region to the eastward, and at an early date in the foreign occupation of Alaska became a basis for supplies.

The entire fur trade in Russian America was placed by charter in the hands of the Russian-American Fur Company in 1799, which, like the Hudson's Bay Company, had territorial jurisdiction as well as trade monopoly. This powerful company maintained its existence under various renewals of its charter until the purchase of Alaska by the United States in 1867. The authority conferred on the Russian company gave it exclusive right to purchase furs from the natives, and thus to dictate prices. This system was fraught with evil to the natives, and their extinction would no doubt have resulted had it not been for the influence of missionaries of the Russian-Greek Church, among whom the name of Veniaminoff will ever be held in blessed memory. In a measure the gross oppression of the Russians brought its own punishment to the offenders. The decrease in the number of the Aleutians meant a decline in the number of pelts secured. To insure the gathering of the highly prized furs the native hunters must be maintained. The later days of Russian occupation were characterized by more humane treatment of the natives, schools were established among them, liquors withheld, and their rapid decline checked. When Alaska was purchased by the United States the Russian-American Fur Company was supplanted by the Alaskan Commercial Company, to whom a lease of the Pribilof Islands was granted. In this lease provision was made for the support and education of the Aleutians on the Pribilof Islands. As the chief and almost the sole employment open to the Aleutians during the past thirty years has been the taking of sealskins on these islands, this wise provision had a beneficent influence on the entire tribe. How faithfully the Alaskan Commercial Company carried out its contract has been seriously questioned, but it is, nevertheless, a fact that the Aleutians have fared better under American than under Russian rule. A gradual adverse change in their condition has come about, however, owing to the decrease and threatened extinction of the sea-otter, and the great decline in the number of the fur-seals owing to the attacks made on them during their annual migrations, which amounts to commercial extinction. The lucrative industries of the natives have thus practically disappeared, and there is nothing to take their place. The surviving members are objects of charity, but as yet the United States Government has made no adequate provision for their support. One method of ameliorating the existing adverse conditions that is practicable is the introduction of domesticated reindeer; another, not so easy to accomplish, is the suppression of the liquor traffic.

THE INDIANS

The aborigines of the New World to the southward of the narrow strip of arctic coast-land inhabited by the Eskimo are designated by the term Indian, as already explained. There is no sharp line of demarcation between the Indians of North and South America, one shading into the other, but only those of the northern continent are here considered.

In many scientific treatises, as well as in books of travel and general literature, the Indians are frequently referred to as "red men," and the term "copper coloured" commonly applied to them. To the writer each of these expressions seems infelicitous. It is true that throughout America the Indians have a reddish undertone in their colour, but in numerous tribes it is not pronounced. As to copper colour, the meaning of the term is vague. What is copper colour? Presumably the colour of the pure metal when unoxidized. No such colour is more than suggested even by the aborigines having the lightest skins in the members of the many tribes that have come under the writer's notice. A more correct term--but this is a matter of opinion, in which differences are permissible--would be brown, of which many shades occur, ranging from light cinnamon colour to dark chocolate, and even nearly black. There is no recognisable connection between variations in colour and climatic conditions. The faces, hands, and other freely exposed portions of their bodies are darker than the parts usually covered with clothing, and frequently suggest the appearance of bronze statutes not fully darkened by exposure to the weather. In colour they more nearly approach that of the Polynesians than any other peoples, but in general are of a darker hue. The members of the various Indian tribes, although presenting a wide range of differences, have many physiological and mental resemblances, which, like their languages, serve to set them apart from all other peoples. A composite picture of their persons would show a man sinewy rather than heavy in build, but there are many exceptions; of average stature, 5 feet 8 or 10 inches, but there are tribes whose average is more, and others in which it is less; dark brown, with a reddish undertone, in colour; deep-set, black, and in general small eyes, their alignment straight; the nose prominent and frequently well shaped; mouth large, with strong, frequently perfect teeth; lower jaw massive; and face beardless or nearly so, and the hair of the scalp long, coarse, and black. In order to make such a sketch realistic, the bronze-like athletic figure must be clothed in a blanket worn with the grace of a Roman toga or wrapped in a robe of bison-skin; the feet encased in moccasins of tanned deerskin, and usually decorated with beads or variously coloured porcupine-quills; the face striped, dotted, or blotched with various colours; the coarse hair falling like a thatch to the shoulder, or braided, and in certain tribes shaved or plucked, except only the traditional scalp-lock, and decorated with feathers, most frequently of the eagle; necklaces, rings in the ears, amulets, etc., made of the claws of the bear, shells, beads, quills, etc., bespeak various tribes; the primitive weapons were the hatchet-like tomahawk, the bow and arrow, and the spear. The Indian has been idealized in the writings of poets and novelists, but occasionally, even at the present day, one meets with an approach to the ideal. Judged by the standards of civilization, as he is seen to-day on numerous reservations and about the streets of towns, he is a lazy, dirty vagabond. A far more favourable and agreeable picture is presented, especially in the eastern portion of Canada and adjacent States to the south and in the Indian Territory, where the blessings of civilization have been accepted and the once roaming savage has become a tiller of the soil, an owner of cattle and sheep, and lives in a comfortable house supplied with furniture such as white men use.

While a racial likeness impossible to conceal unites all of the various tribes, no single picture or generalized description, however carefully prepared, can convey to one unfamiliar with the Indian an accurate idea of his personal appearance. A typical example from one tribe when critically studied is found to differ widely from an equally representative example of another tribe, not only in speech, dress, methods of wearing the hair, ornaments, etc., but also in physique and in mental traits.

In temperament the Indian is usually described as being moody, reserved, wary, grave, and his face expressionless, the current of his thoughts being unrevealed in his proud, indifferent bearing. In his own mind he seems to consider himself superior to all other beings, and to regard them with contemptuous indifference. All this is true enough as seen by a stranger, but in his home life, and not infrequently when in the presence of trusted white men, the mask of indifference is laid aside and the laugh and jest indulged in. The extreme of assumed indifference is exhibited, as has been well attested by many witnesses, when death by torture is inflicted on a captive, as, for example, burning alive, when no outward sign is permitted to reveal his intense suffering.

The Indian is a hunter and fisherman both from inheritance and necessity. From his mode of life his sense of sight and of hearing have become wonderfully acute. His skill in following a trail is proverbial. When living near the sea or by the side of streams and lakes he is as much at home in a canoe as his relative of the plains in post-Columbian days when seated on his hardy pony. In current literature, however, all of these traits, as in the case of the personality of the Indian, have been fused into one ideal. It is true that the Indian hunter is more skilled in following a trail, in interpreting the signs and sounds in the forest, in shooting the foaming rapids in his frail canoe, etc., than the average white man to whom such pursuits are incidental or newly acquired; but many white men, and particularly those who have in a measure degenerated and assumed the Indian mode of life, are his equal, if not his superior, in all that pertains to woodcraft.

In mental qualities the Indian is the inferior of the Caucasian and the Asiatic, but is the superior of the negro. The ability to advance is not absent, and capacity to reach a certain grade in civilization is general, but beyond the acquirement of indifferent skill in the arts, literature, etc., but few have passed. The mental quality of perseverance under adverse conditions and of continuous application has not been granted him.