Chapter V: THE KITUNAHA.--The Kitunaha, Cutani, Cootanie or Flatbow area is

long rather than broad, and it follows the line of the Rocky Mountains between 52° and 48° north latitude. How definitely it is divided by the main ridge from that of the Blackfoots I am unable to say, but as a general rule, the Kutani lie west, the Blackfoots east; the former being Indians of New Caledonia and Oregon, the latter of the Hudson's Bay Territory and the United States. On the west the Kutani country is bounded by that of the Shushwap and Selish Atnas, on the north by the Sussee, Sikanni, and Nagail Athabaskans, on the south (I think) by some of the Upsaroka or Crow tribes. All these relations are remarkable, and so is the geographical position of the area. It is in a mountain-range; and, as such, in a district likely to be an ancient occupancy. The languages with which the Kutani lies in contact are referable to four different families--the Athabaskan, the Atna, the Algonkin, and the Sioux; the last two of which, the Blackfoot (Algonkin) and the Crow (Sioux), are both extreme forms, _i. e._ forms sufficiently unlike the other members of these respective groups to have had their true position long overlooked; forms, too, sufficiently peculiar to justify the philologue in raising them to the rank of separate divisions. It suffices, however, for the present to say, that the Kutani language is bounded by four tongues differing in respect to the class to which they belong and from each other, and different from the Kutani itself.

The Kutani, then, differs notably from the tongues with which it is in geographical contact; though, like all the languages of America, it has numerous miscellaneous affinities. In respect to its phonesis it agrees with the North Oregon languages. The similarity in name to the Loucheux, whom Richardson calls _Kutshin_, deserves notice. Upon the whole, few languages deserve attention more than the one under notice.