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BLOOD GROUPS AND PHYSIOGNOMY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA COASTAL
INDIANS.

[With Prates I-V].
By R. Ruaeres Gates, D.Sc., LL.D., F.R.S., and Gro. E. Darsy, B.A., M.B.

‘Many aspects of the racial significance of blood groups are still sub judice, but there appear to
be certain cases at least in which a knowledge of the blood grouping will throw light on racial
relationships. This subject was briefly discussed elsewhere (Gates, 1929, Chap. ix), and the
racial significance of the blood groups pointed out. It appeared to the senior author that
the Indian tribes of British Columbia afforded a case where a knowledge of the blood groups
would be of value. These people have frequently been considered by anthropologists to be
more Mongoloid in appearance than other American Indians. Now it is known (see Hirszfeld,
1928, Steffan, 1932) that the present population of Manchuria and the Mongolian peoples
generally have a high proportion of B, whereas the pure-blooded American Indians of various
tribes tested in Canada and the United States have been found to be practically all O (see Gates,
19294). The evidence is clear that they contain no B, and it is only a question whether the
few A’s found are the result of early sporadic crosses with Europeans or are due to occasional
mutations from the O condition among the Indians themselves. This matter will be discussed
ater.

The problem in view in this investigation was then whether the British Columbia coastal

tribes might represent a later wave of immigration from the Asiatic continent (whence it is
generally agreed’ they all originally came) in which case they might be expected to be more
Mongoloid in appearance and to have some proportion of the B blood group, or whether they
are to be ranked as essentially similar in origin to other Indian groups. In the result only
two individuals having B blood group were found among 300 Indians tested. Hence the
-conclusion seems clear that these Indians do not necessarily belong to a later wave than others,
_and that their ancestors must have passed over Behring Strait before the present peoples, who
have a high proportion of B, occupied the north-eastern corner of Asia. As we shall see, there
has been much crossing of these Indians with people of European descent, and it is rather
surprising that the number showing the B blood group is so low in the present results.

The serum for this work was provided for the senior author through the kindness: of Messrs.

Parke, Davis & Co., and St. Mary’s Hospital, London. The serum for testing the 31 Nootkas
was obtained from Dr. Pitts, of the Vancouver General Hospital. The blood tests, photographs
and observations were all made by Dr. Darby, Medical Superintendent of the R.W. Large
Memorial Hospital at Bella Bella, B.C., except those of ten interior Indians from the Bella
Coola valley, which were taken by Dr. H. A. McLean, of Bella Coola. The sera retained their

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