The daily morning journal and courier., 1894-12-19
RUDE INDIAN HERALDRY.

cult Make Out.
 From the Seattle 1elegraph.l
 Far up in the North Pacific ocean
 nearly opposite the southern panhan
 dle of Alaska territory. are several is
 lands, among them the Queen Char
 lotte Islands and the Prince of Vale
 Archipelago. There is nothing unusua
 about these islands In topographica
 appearance. They present the saEu
 broken surface. snow-capped mo :n
 tains. and deep canons. with huge land
 slides and sparkling glacial aspect SC
 common in that region. But thes;
 same islands of summer rains and fogi
 and winter Ice and snow are peoplet
 by one of the most remarkable races
 of aborigines found on the American
 continent. Like nearly all of the rest
 of the Indians of the northwest coast
 they live by hunting and fishing. and
 as the lands inhabited by them are
 rough and broken, and subdivided Into
 such small tracts by the numerous
 mountain ranges. their only means of travel Is by water.
 The Indians about Dixon entrance are unquestionably superior In phy- sique to the coast Indians to the south ward, and among themselves the physi- cal superiority rests with the Haida. This may be due to real ethnlcal diff ferences. but Is probably accounted for in the fact that natural conditions in the Queen Charlotte Islands and around such an exposed arm as Dixon entrance have proved finer and more robust people than those in less ex- posed regions. While there is consid- erable uniformity in the general phys ical character of all the stocks on the northwest coast. a practsed eye can readily detect the difference between them. One visiting the Haidas sees many strikingly intelligent and attrac- tive faces among the older men and women. where experience has given character to their expressions. The dullness attributed to the Indians of the interior here gives place to a more alert expression of countenance. They acquire knowledge readily, and since schools have been established among them their children have made fair progress. They learn all trades with readiness, and before the missionaries and traders came among them they ex- hibited much ingenuity, not only in the erection of comfortable dwelling houses, but in their numerous carvings on wood and slate, their working and engraving on copper, and the erection of those great totem columns which make every Haida village famous.
 But little is generally known of the real meaning of these great columns that form such a prominent feature In the Haida settlements. Government experts have been among them during the summer months of several seasons and studied them as thoroughly as was possible at such seasons of the year. Judge James G. Swan, of Port Town send, has also gathered a valuable and complete collection of Haida carvings, engravings, basket work, implements, &c.,, for the Smithsonian Institute, but thus far there has been but little at- tention given to the systematic study of the mythology of the race, as that can only be studied with satisfaction during the winter months when the na- tives are collected in their various homes, thus rendering 1t possible for only a few of the more inquisitive mis- sionaries and traders to know any thing of the legends that compose the rich folk lore of the Haida nations. A totem is rude picture or carving as Of a bird or other animal, used as a sym bol of family. It represents a class of material objects which savage re- gards with superstitious respect, be- lieving that there exists between him and every member of the class an ln- innate and altogether special relation. The connection between man and his totem is beneficial one to the other; the totem protects the man, and in return he shows his respect by not killing 1t, if it be an animal, and by not cutting or gathering it if it be plant.
 There are at least three kinds Of to- tems, namely, the clan totem, sex to- tenn and individual totem. The clan totem is common to a whole clan and passes by inheritance from one genera ton to another, while the individual totem belongs to but one person and does not pass to his descendants. From their nature totems are constant ly undergoing change. Clans tend to become phrateries, split up into sub- phrateries; sub-phrateries decay and finally disappear. An individual be- comes wealthy or otherwise d1stln- guishes himself, and being one of the leading men of the tribe, his totem, or rather his crest, or sub-totem, which may previously have been an obscure one, rises with him as he advances in importance in his tribe. Under his suc- cessors the totem widens in its num- bers and influence and finally eclipses other clan totems, which in time melt away or are incorporated with 1t.
 A single system of totems extends throughout the different tribes of the Haidas. The principal totems found among them are the eagle, wolf, crow, black bear, brown bear and thrasher. The sub-totem usually copes from naming the child after some natural objects from some accidental circum- stance or fanciful resemblance or in in after life. The Haida r,ato,s of 1Jou,1-oh ostan rarnat a 1e-