FISHING. 195

a new one that has been used but once, probably in the wrong place. It
is here the question of personal supernatural powers extended to things
inanimate.

However, barring the very pronounced ideas concerning the malefic in-
fluences of menstruating women, few of the practices, formerly in honour
among the Déné fishermen, have successfully resisted the inroads of civilization
among them. When I say fishermen I am somewhat astray. In the north, the
men spear fish and help in the capture of entrapped salmon; but fishing with
nets falls almost invariably to the lot of the women.

In Hearne’s time, whenever a Déné baited a hook preparatory to angling
or fishing under the ice, an aggregate of four, five or six articles more or
less foreign to the object in view, was concealed by way of charm under the
bait, which was sewed round the hook. In fact, the only bait then used was
a bunch of charms enclosed in a piece of fish-skin made to resemble a fry.
This consisted in bits of beaver tails and fat, otter vents and teeth, musk-rat
guts and tails, loon vents, squirrel testicles, the curdled milk extracted from
the stomach of suckling fawns and calves, human hair, and other articles
equally absurd under the circumstances.

As the old author says, “‘without some of those articles to put under
their bait, few of them could be prevailed upon to put a hook into the water,
being fully persuaded that they may as well sit in the tent as attempt to
angle without such assistance’. Acting upon the above enunciated principle,
they esteemed an old hook that had already been successful far above a
handful of new ones that had never been tried.

So was it with the net. To attain its fullest efficiency, it must be
accoutred with a variety of the most unlikely articles. Bird bills and feet
were fastened to the head and foot rope of the net, while toes and jaws of
otters and minks were also made to contribute their share towards the
usefulness of the same. The natives then firmly believed, according to the
same author, that not a single fish could be caught without those pre-
cautions.

Furthermore, it was forbidden to boil the first specimen of any kind
of fish captured in a new net. It had to be broiled whole on the fire,
and its flesh carefully taken off the bones without dislocating one joint;
after which the bones were laid on the fire, at full length, and burned. A
strict observance of these rules was deemed of the utmost importance to en-
sure the success of a net, and neglect of the same was believed to render it
worthless.

‘ Op. cit., pp. 330—831.
13*